Biologist who did business intelligence at a hedge fund for nearly a decade here.

The data we buy in finance has a price tag weighed against the value of information it contains.

Biologists don’t often think of the value of information in financial terms, but this is crucial. In finance, we can ballpark the value of information based on the end result of the total volume of arbitrage opportunities (not just a % change, but actual number of dollars you could make trading on that info).

For bio, we’re not developing trading strategies but implicitly data drives decisions and so we need to refocus on the decisions. Are we making a diagnosis? Preparing medical managers for a surge of medical demand? Choosing a medicine with more specific estimation of safety and efficacy? Making decisions about warfighter behavioral/protocol changes in light of an outbreak in the unit? Making a new drug?

From a business intelligence perspective, the decisions we’re trying to make should inform the “request for data/information” phrased in terms of the quantity we’re trying to better estimate.

That can inform which data provides the valuable information, creating a better economic exchange of information on biological systems.