# Where to license company data

> Searching where to sell company data? You license it through a direct program, a marketplace, a shutdown service or a referral site. What each one publishes.

By Matt Burns, Vaultfish. Canonical: https://vaultfish.com/answers/where-to-sell-company-data  
Published: 2026-08-24  
Updated: 2026-10-14

## The short answer

Company data reaches AI through four routes. Direct programs like micro1 pay under a data partnership and post payment tiers. Marketplaces like Troveo pay a share of each deal and keep the split private. Shutdown services take only firms winding down. Referral sites pass your details to a partner.

Four routes exist today. Each trades price clarity, speed and control differently. Facts below are self-reported unless a source is named.

> **A direct program pays you under a partnership or license. A marketplace pays you a share each time it resells.** One is a yard sale. The other is renting out a room.

## Is a direct program the clearest route?

[micro1](/buyers/micro1) and [Handshake AI](/buyers/handshake-ai) pay companies directly, under their own partnerships. micro1 lists $100K+, $500K+ and $1M+ tiers. Its Enterprise Data Partnership listing says $100K-$2M+ for approved data packages. Handshake AI says $100K to $4M+.

In an undated recorded forum talk, David Revland, who works on human data at micro1, said its engineers walk your IT team through the transfer and that micro1 checks the data before paying.

In the same talk, micro1's CFO put the company's side at about 10 hours of work from one or two IT people.

micro1 staff also said in the same talk that micro1 does the de-identification itself and that companies cannot pre-scrub.

[De-identification](/answers/data-de-identification) covers why that matters.

## What does a data marketplace like Troveo offer?

[Troveo](https://www.troveo.ai/business-data) says it pays a revenue share on every sale to buyers and takes no OAuth access to your systems. It has not published the split, and the buyer is usually unnamed. You get repeat sales. You give up price clarity.

## What about a shutdown service?

SimpleClosure's Asset Hub sells data for startups winding down. It reported nearly 100 deals at $10,000 to $100,000 per company in its first year ([Gizmodo](https://gizmodo.com/failed-companies-are-selling-old-slack-chats-and-email-archives-to-train-ai-2000747916)).

Its [AssetHub page](https://simpleclosure.com/product/assethub/) says operating companies can license too. It takes a percentage only on a completed deal and publishes no rate.

Sunset runs a similar service, and its terms are not published.

## What is a data referral front end?

A referral front end is a site that collects your details, often through a calculator, and passes them to a partner it may not name. It gets paid when the introduction lands.

The buyer is named late or not at all, so ask who it is before you share anything. Our [red flags page](/answers/ai-data-broker-red-flags) lists the other checks.

Figure: comparison of Routes for licensing company data: Direct program (emphasized: Publishes the clearest tiers, Partnership or license), Marketplace (Shares each sale), Shutdown service (Startups winding down). A direct program pays you under a partnership or license, so it publishes the clearest price tiers.

## How do I choose?

Ask each route four things. Who pays whom? What do you hand over, and when? Who de-identifies? What can you still read in the contract?

Compare routes on what each publishes about price, custody of your data and fees. The [buyer directory](/buyers) lists the buyers we track side by side.

_Four routes, four ways to say "it depends." Ask each one for the numbers in writing._

micro1 may pay us a referral fee if a company we introduce goes ahead with it. [How we are paid](https://vaultfish.com/disclosure)

Run the [rights check](/rights-check) before any call. Talk to a privacy or commercial lawyer in your state before you sign.

[Apply to micro1's data partnership (paid link)](https://req.micro1.ai/post/74520e8b-4673-4da5-b855-53609aaf6710?referralCode=f82e519e-5d64-4e0e-9574-760c84371cf2&utm_source=referral&utm_medium=share&utm_campaign=data_referral) · [micro1's own data-partnerships page](https://www.micro1.ai/data-partnerships)

_Paid link. [How we are paid](https://vaultfish.com/disclosure)_

_Vaultfish helps you run the process. We are not lawyers and this is not legal advice. If you need counsel who knows this area, we can point you to one._

## Sources

- [Troveo](https://www.troveo.ai/business-data)
- [Gizmodo](https://gizmodo.com/failed-companies-are-selling-old-slack-chats-and-email-archives-to-train-ai-2000747916)
- [AssetHub page](https://simpleclosure.com/product/assethub/)