Primet
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This document discusses the pricing of public sector information (PSI) in the meteorological sector in Europe and how it blocks market development. It notes that national meteorological services have a monopoly on data and charge high prices for licenses and data, making it difficult for private sector companies to be profitable. As a result, the weather market in Europe is less than half the size it could be. The document calls for PSI to be more freely available and for governments to remove themselves from directly competing in the weather market.
Primet
- 1. PRIMET: The Association of Private Meteorological Services PRIMET Ltd a company limited by guarantee No 7335206 Pricing of PSI in the Meteorological Sector blocks market development R.E.W. Pettifer General Secretary 5/8/2011 1
- 2. The (National) Meteorological Market in Europe Anti competitive Value Adding National Meteorological Service Arm (Monopoly data (PSI) supplier) Pr o PSI Charges, Licenses du ct and data flow MARKET Margin Product dev costs + Data costs & licenses = Price Product Fixed costs Private Sector Value Adding Retailer 5/8/2011 2
- 3. How big is the roadblock? • The cost annual of the basic minimum data set for operational weather forecasting is:* – Company† in Luxembourg: € 238,831 – Company in France: € 285,000 – Company in Poland: € 84,000 *Prices are obtained from the ECOMET, EUMETSAT and ECMWF web sites and include all relevant discounts †Companies are hypothetical but are based on real data drawn from several PRIMET members 5/8/2011 3
- 4. What is the Market? • Typical single contract values: – Luxembourg case (general “weather forecasting”): € 10,000 – 15,000 – France (Highways operations): € 20,000 – Poland (general energy market): € 6,000 • To be profitable requires typically 20 such contracts. Impossible for SME (especially start ups) 5/8/2011 4
- 5. Other factors • No “single market” because – Each NMS autonomous and does not “trade data” across national boundaries • PS Company must deal with separate NMS in each country where it wants to trade. • NMS do not operate their value added business entirely at “arms length” • NMS required to obtain some of their funding from the “market place” 5/8/2011 5
- 6. What are the consequences? • Market cannot grow and is less than half the size it should be. – ~ € 530million/year • (c.f. USA ~ € 1 billion) • European treasuries loose net taxation revenues of around € 290million each year. 5/8/2011 6
- 7. Removing the Roadblocks • All PSI should be available in a timely fashion at the marginal cost of re-distribution. – Already paid for by the taxpayers: they are the owners of the data. • All PSI should be re-useable for profit under simple, non restrictive licenses (e.g. as Canada) • Major revision of the Directive needed. • Political will and decisions required to achieve this. – Remove government from the market place (c.f. USA) • No recovery of treasury costs directly from the market 5/8/2011 7