One buyer names logistics and manufacturing among the sectors it buys from.

It says its typical deals run from $100,000 to $2 million and above.

No buyer page publishes a dollar figure for a manufacturing, freight, logistics or distribution company, and we found no trade-press coverage of one.

That range is not specific to manufacturing or logistics, and it is not a promise of what you would be offered.

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Is this for your company?

Tick the boxes that fit your company:

  • 30 or more people
  • 3 or more years in operation, and 3 or more years of records kept
  • Your orders, shipments and inventory are kept in systems like NetSuite, SAP, Odoo or Dynamics, shared drives and email
  • The company owns its records: they are your own operating records, not files you hold for clients
  • The company is in the US (today's buyers take US companies first)

One buyer's published criteria are, word for word, "20+ full time employees & 3+ years in operation". This checklist uses 30 or more people. Our quiz also looks for three or more years of records kept: it asks how far back your records go, not when the company started. The other lines come from our own site terms and quiz. If a box isn't ticked yet, the quiz asks about each of these.

What gets licensed: the systems you already run

AI companies are training software to do multi-step work, and moving or making goods is multi-step work. An order comes in. Someone plans it, picks a carrier and a route, or schedules a line. Plans slip, and someone changes them. Something arrives damaged, a claim is filed and settled, and the procedure gets updated.

Two buyers publish what they look for. We call them the second buyer, which lists NetSuite, QuickBooks, monday.com, Slack, Gmail and Outlook among the sources it buys, and the case-study buyer, the one above whose FAQ names logistics and manufacturing. Its guide to the data sources it covers, with notes on where to find counts, has a Field operations section covering work orders, dispatch, deliveries, job tickets and site records. It names ERP and accounting systems (NetSuite, SAP, Odoo, Microsoft Dynamics 365 Business Central, Sage Intacct, QuickBooks and Xero) and ecommerce systems (Shopify, Amazon Seller Central, WooCommerce and BigCommerce). It also covers Gmail and Outlook, Google Drive, SharePoint, OneDrive and Dropbox, and Slack and Microsoft Teams.

We found no buyer page that names a TMS, WMS or MES product, so we don't list one. For a plant, carrier or distributor, that can mean:

  • Operating procedures and SOPs
  • Order, dispatch and delivery history
  • Exception, delay, damage and claims records, and how each was fixed
  • Inventory and ERP history
  • Email and chat between the office, the floor or drivers, suppliers and customers

What never leaves your company

Your originals and your customers' identities. The buyer gets a copy of the records you agree to license, and de-identifies it. Your systems and your originals stay where they are. The second buyer says you decide exactly what is shared, and that all data is scoped, de-identified and kept confidential. The case-study buyer's home page says that, as a general term of its licenses, you keep the business and the underlying data, and that the license is defined and bounded. Its case-study page describes each license as anonymized before delivery, and it says a specialist privacy partner removes or replaces names, emails, phone numbers, account numbers and addresses before it or any buyer sees the record. Its FAQ says its license doesn't cover what you hold on behalf of your own clients.

Files you hold for clients. Our own site terms go further. Records your company holds for clients under contract, records covered by professional privilege, regulated data such as patient or financial-account information, and anything you are not entitled to license must not be offered to a buyer. If in doubt, leave it out and ask your lawyer.

Nothing goes to a buyer before you see the buyer's name. If you ask us for an introduction, the buyers' names are shown to you before you click, and nothing about your answers goes to a buyer until you do. Even then we send only your quiz answers and the contact details you entered: no files, no logins, and not the estimate.

What federal law says. Under 49 U.S.C. §14908(a)(1), a carrier or broker "may not disclose to another person, except the shipper or consignee, ... information about the nature, kind, quantity, destination, consignee, or routing of property tendered or delivered to that carrier or broker for transportation provided under this part without the consent of the shipper or consignee if that information may be used to the detriment of the shipper or consignee or may disclose improperly to a competitor the business transactions of the shipper or consignee."

What is unknown. We found no statement from a regulator or a court on whether removing shipper, consignee and carrier names takes a record outside §14908.

How the money works

Here is how we are paid, in the words of our fee disclosure:

If a buyer we introduce you to signs a license with your company, that buyer pays us a referral fee: a fixed amount, a percentage of the license, or both, depending on the buyer. You pay nothing, now or later, unless you and we sign a separate written agreement that says so. We may share part of our fee with the partner who sent you to us; they see only your company's name and the stage of the process.

Your estimate is never shown to a buyer. It is for you, and it stays with you.

Among the published deals we found are a roofing company at $450,000, a general contractor at $300,000 and a solar company at $275,000, each on the case-study page as a "Perpetual exclusive license to the operational record." None of these is a manufacturer, carrier or distributor, and none tells you what yours would be paid.

Both buyers also publish pay ranges: typical deals from $100,000 to $2 million and above, and payouts from $100,000 to $4 million and more. Neither range is specific to manufacturing or logistics, and neither is a promise of what you would be offered.

One buyer's page on that question calls licensing a company's own operating record an ordinary commercial deal, decided by "ownership, what the company's customer contracts say, and whether personal information can be removed." Its example of what can't be licensed is material held for a client under an agreement giving the client ownership. The same page says state definitions vary and your own counsel should review any license before signing.

If you are a carrier or broker, the federal rule above applies on top. Read every shipper contract and broker-carrier agreement for confidentiality and data-use terms before anything leaves your systems.

What the quiz asks

The quiz asks what your company does, whether it is operating, winding down or closed, where the company and the team are, how many people work there, what year your records go back to, which tools your team uses, roughly how much of your records are in English, who owns them, two yes-or-no checks, and whether you run one company or more. Round numbers are fine for headcount, and you see your range before you give an email.

Who is behind this

Kedric Van de Carr is the founder of ValueMyData.ai and is based in Texas. He built it as an independent tool that estimates what a company's operational data is worth and introduces the owner to the buyer that fits. Kedric reads every question himself. There are no sales calls: the quiz shows your range on screen, and nothing goes to a buyer unless you ask for an introduction. Questions go to kedric@valuemydata.ai.

See what my records are worth

A short quiz. No email needed to see your range.

We are not lawyers, accountants, brokers of securities or financial advisers, and nothing on the site is legal, tax, investment or financial advice. Have your own adviser review any agreement before you sign it.

Boss Financial Education L.L.C., doing business as ValueMyData.ai · kedric@valuemydata.ai · Texas

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