Data Partnerships

Financial institutions hold the UK's most valuable economic intelligence.

And this data doesn’t just reflect the economy - it is the economy. With it comes a responsibility to build a stronger, fairer UK.

Become a partner

The untapped reality of financial data

Every transaction, loan application and payment reveals something about the state of the UK economy. But at the moment, this data is largely locked away and used solely for commercial purposes.

Financial data can provide a real-time economic pulse, showing early indicators of recession, recovery and inflation months before official statistics. And it is also a social mirror, exposing financial inclusion gaps, vulnerable communities and regional opportunities.

At Smart Data Foundry, we work with pioneering data partners to safely unlock these insights for public good; turning insights into impact that can change lives.

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Join our pioneering data partners

Secure, ethical, data sharing creates impact at scale:

Child poverty interventions

Anonymised consumer data, provided weekly, feeds into the Economic Wellbeing Explorer. This provides granular insights at a community level to Local Authorities, with the result that they are better able to target service interventions and provide families in crisis with support much more quickly.

Impact: Thousands of children in poverty reached more quickly with essential community support.

Research into the poverty premium

With a strong ESG commitment to understanding the Poverty Premium, Virgin Money asked us to help identify and quantify unfair extra costs for low-income households. Our analysis of their transaction data revealed the extent of these unfair extra costs for basic services.

Impact: Helping inform national debate and powering advocacy for regulatory changes.

Tracking SME health and productivity

SME expenditure and payroll data produces insights which highlight late payment risks and cash flow pressures on the UK's small and medium enterprises. These insights, and more, feed the Quarterly Small Business Tracker produced by Sage CEBR and Smart Data Foundry.

Impact: Opportunity to influence UK government small business policy.

Create lasting, positive social impact

Our data partners demonstrate leadership in ethical data use and are pioneers in using data to drive positive societal change. Partners can advance their ESG and social purpose agendas with tangible, evidence-driven initiatives fuelled by research and innovation from world-class academics.

Shape the future of ethical data sharing

Our data partners are at the forefront of the growing Smart Data movement, and are helping to shape the emerging data-sharing mandate driven by regulators and legislators. To streamline growing data sharing requests, partners can rely on us to act as a trusted intermediary to support responsible use of your data for research.

Long-term market edge

Your data fuels research which has a direct influence on government and policy and creates early insights into new economic and social trends. As a data partner, you benefit from early access to this groundbreaking research. And your support of the data for good movement can help to strengthen customer trust and attract and retain top talent with a strong social-impact agenda.

What our partners say

"Data for Good is our commitment to help small and medium businesses thrive. Our partnership with Smart Data Foundry help us turn anonymised data into powerful insights, enabling better decision making by stakeholders in business and policy and helping us to meet our commitment to SMBs."

Name: Will Taggart
Role: Sage UK

Safeguarding, ethics and information governance

Safeguarding sensitive data and ensuring ethical research practices are central to our Information Governance Framework.

We follow the Five Safes model, reinforced by security controls and data protection measures. This includes data classification, stringent access controls, encryption protocols, deidentification processes, data minimisation, and ethical assessments including Data Privacy Impact Assessments (DPIAs).

We require all research using our data to undergo ethical review, focusing on protecting public data rights, addressing biases or missing perspectives, and assessing societal benefits and risks. These principles guide how we acquire, manage, and share our data, ensuring we operate responsibly at every step.

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