IBM and The Weather Company are combining business data, weather data and data from the Internet of Things (IoT) to transform enterprise decision making. Learn more about leveraging weather data in your industry: http://ibm.co/weatherinsight.

1. #WeatherMeansBiz
How IoT and weather
data are transforming
business decisions
Enabling transformative decision making
across industries with precise, accurate
and integrated weather data

2. #WeatherMeansBiz
The challenge for business
Weather causes
US businesses to
lose $500 billion
each year.1
In 2014, the US
economy lost nearly
$500 billion
76,000 jobs
in sales and
because of weather.2
$

3. #WeatherMeansBiz
Weather broadly affects
many industries
Energy and utilities:
78 percent of electric grid
disruptions are weather-related,
affecting nearly
178 million metered customers.3
Emergency management:
In 2014, natural disasters
cost $100 billion and
claimed 7,700 lives
worldwide.5
Insurance: Insurers
could save as much as
$25 per policyholder by
providing alerts before
events such as hailstorms.4
Retail: 81% of retailers
that incorporate weather
data into supply chain
decisions report heightened
on-shelf availability.6

4. #WeatherMeansBiz
Move from cope and avoid
to anticipate and execute
Together, IBM and The Weather Company are combining business data, weather data
and data from the Internet of Things (IoT) to transform enterprise decision making.
These advances enable companies to take a proactive approach to optimizing business
processes and strategies for the impacts of weather.

5. #WeatherMeansBiz
Mapping the atmosphere: A big
data and IoT approach to weather
Advances in weather science, analytics, geolocation, cloud capabilities and
the IoT let The Weather Company deliver 26 billion forecasts a day.
2.2 billion weather
forecast locations
Data from 40 million
mobile devices
Atmospheric data from
50,000 flights per day
140,000 worldwide
weather stations
200 meteorologists

6. #WeatherMeansBiz
The Weather Company provides
accurate and timely weather data
Precision
100× greater coverage than
publicly available sources
Accuracy
Rated first in the accuracy
of its one- to three-day
forecasts
Speed
Forecasts updated every
15 minutes for 2.2 billion
locations
Over 140,000 worldwide weather stations

7. #WeatherMeansBiz
Businesses can do more than
just react to the weather
Insurance companies
alert policyholders
Utilities mitigate
outages
Emergency planners
respond to citizens
Retailers anticipate
demand

8. #WeatherMeansBiz
Help policyholders weather the storm
Engage policyholders
Alert policyholders in advance of
adverse weather conditions to help
protect property and lives.
Mitigate claims
Speed claims processing
by relying on pre-positioned
adjusters and extra call center
staff.
Manage risk
Use advanced and historical
weather data to appropriately price
policies and reduce risk.
Leverage telematics
Combine telematics and weather
data to help policyholders avoid
accidents, to aid claims
investigations and to deploy
user-based insurance policies.
Data from IBM and The Weather Company helps insurers do the following:

9. #WeatherMeansBiz
Keep the lights on
IBM and The Weather Company help the energy industry
to do the following:
Predict outages
Power companies can integrate hyperlocal weather data and lightning
prediction models with operational data to help them accurately
predict potential infrastructure outages, pre-positioning crews and
equipment to help mitigate outages quickly.
Anticipate asset failure
Combining weather data with asset information and predictive
analytics can help provide understanding of how weather affects
asset failure and thus allow proactive maintenance, condition-based
maintenance and efficient allocation of capital for asset purchases.

10. #WeatherMeansBiz
Stay ahead of
the storm
By integrating data from The Weather Company into the IBM Intelligent Operations
Center for Emergency Management, emergency managers can do the following:
Increase lead time
Proprietary 15-day
probabilistic models deliver
1.5 days’ additional lead
time for tropical storms
and hurricanes.
Respond rapidly
Using weather data at
500 m2
resolution, responders
can pinpoint and remediate
worst-hit areas first.
Plan for storm scenarios
The Weather Company’s
ensemble forecast system
helps responders enhance
their plans by creating multiple
realistic storm scenarios.

11. #WeatherMeansBiz
Anticipate shopper behavior
Data from IBM and The Weather Company
helps retailers do the following:
Manage supply chains
By pairing long-term and seasonal forecasts with
predictive analytics, retailers can proactively manage
inventory and interactions with suppliers.
Predict store traffic
Using hyperlocal forecasts and predictive analytics,
stores can adjust staffing levels to reduce costs
during periods of low traffic or can add staff to better
serve customers during weather events that increase
demand.
Create weather-based marketing strategies
By combining customer analytics with weather
and location data, retailers can create highly
targeted weather-driven offers delivered to
mobile devices at the point of impact.

12. #WeatherMeansBiz
Learn how weather means
business for you
Download your copy of the paper
Weather Means Business to learn
how you can transform decision
making by integrating precise
weather data and advanced analytics
into your business processes.
Download your copy
2 Weather Means Business™
This paradigm shift in how companies actively use weather as a
differential advantage is an opportunity to take the first steps
toward becoming a cognitive business. A cognitive business
uses every opportunity to interact with data to reason, adapt
and continuously learn. Essentially, a cognitive business places
a premium on making fact-based decisions using data rather
than reacting after the fact. Core to this shift is the capability
to tap into and synthesize myriad diverse data sets, including
weather data, and combining it with business and external data
to add context, depth and confidence to every business decision.
IBM and The Weather Company have partnered to bring
actionable weather insight to businesses across industries.
Combining weather data with traditional business data and
rich data from an unprecedented number of Internet of Things
(IoT)-enabled systems and devices has the potential to
significantly impact enterprise decision-making.
The value of integrating weather into
decision-making
Weather has a profound and widespread influence on business.
We are all vulnerable to unforeseen weather events, and the
inability to manage weather-related risk can limit business
success, thwart economic development and threaten public
safety. It is estimated that weather causes businesses to lose half
a trillion dollars every year.1
In 2014, the US economy alone
lost nearly USD50 billion in sales and 76,000 jobs because
of weather.2
Until now, most businesses have treated weather as a force to
which they can only react. Leading-edge companies today are
taking a different approach, moving from a “cope and avoid”
mindset to “anticipate and execute.” They can now respond to
disruptive weather events, taking early action to mitigate the
impact and return to normal operations more quickly. Even the
calmest weather days present an opportunity for business
optimization—for example, sunny skies and higher
temperatures can affect everything from wildfire danger and
energy demand for air conditioning, to sales of cold beverages. Leading-edge companies today are taking a
different approach, moving from a“cope and
avoid” mindset to“anticipate and execute.”
IBM Analytics 3
Figure 1. Public sources (in red) versus The Weather Company sensors (in yellow).
Advances in weather analytics for better
business outcomes
Enterprises now can use weather-driven insights to improve
business results, largely because advances in weather science,
analytics, geolocation, cloud computing and the harnessing of
data through the IoT have fundamentally changed the paradigm.
IBM technology and analytical capabilities, paired with very
precise and accurate weather data from The Weather Company,
unlock new insights. The Weather Company delivers billions
of forecast requests each day in real time using its own
proprietary model. The IoT enables the company to map the
atmosphere, collecting weather and related information from a
worldwide network of more than 140,000 private weather
stations, aircraft, smartphones, buildings and homes, and even
moving vehicles (Figure 1).
White Paper
IBM Analytics
Weather Means Business™
Enabling transformative decision-making with precise weather data
for energy and utilities, insurance, retailing and the public sector

13. #WeatherMeansBiz
© Copyright IBM Corporation 2016
IBM Analytics
Route 100
Somers, NY 10589
Produced in the United States of America
February 2016
IBM, the IBM logo, ibm.com, and Bluemix are trademarks of International Business Machines
Corp., registered in many jurisdictions worldwide. Other product and service names might be
trademarks of IBM or other companies. A current list of IBM trademarks is available on the web at
“Copyright and trademark information” at ibm.com/legal/copytrade.shtml
This document is current as of the initial date of publication and may be changed by IBM at any
time. Not all offerings are available in every country in which IBM operates.
THE INFORMATION IN THIS DOCUMENT IS PROVIDED “AS IS” WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY,
EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING WITHOUT ANY WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY,
FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE AND ANY WARRANTY OR CONDITION OF NON-
INFRINGEMENT. IBM products are warranted according to the terms and conditions of the
agreements under which they are provided.
1
IBM and The Weather Company study, 2015
2
Steve Liesman, “Economy takes $50B winter weather hit: CNBC survey,” CNBC,
February 14, 2014
3
Weather-Related Power Outages and Electric System Resiliency, Congressional Research
Service, August 28, 2012
4
WSI and Insurance Company Study, 2015
5
Munich RE, “Review of natural catastrophes in 2014: Lower losses from weather extremes and
earthquakes,” January 7, 2015.
6
Understanding the role of weather in the supply chain, Met Office, 2015
IMP14939-USEN-00