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
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