What Is a Data Inventory? The First Step Before Licensing Company Data
By Andrew Smart, founder of MON$TER · About
A data inventory is a plain list of the data your business holds: what it is, which system it lives in, how far back it goes and who controls it. Before anyone can say what your data is worth, someone has to know what you actually have.
Why it matters before licensing
- Valuation starts here. Value depends on what records you hold, how many and how many years. An inventory answers that fast.
- It finds hidden assets. Owners often forget years of history sitting in old software, shared drives or exports.
- It flags risk early. Listing each source shows where personal information sits, so it can be removed before anything leaves your systems. See what counts as PII.
What to list for each source
- System: the software or database (CRM, ERP, ticketing, accounting, scheduling)
- Record type: orders, jobs, tickets, invoices, shipments, usage logs
- Volume and history: rough record count and the earliest year
- Format: how it exports (CSV, database, reports)
- Rights: any software, customer or partner agreement that limits how it can be used
- Personal data: yes or no, and which fields
Inventory vs. data dictionary
An inventory says what data you have and where. A data dictionary explains what each field inside a dataset means. Buyers usually want the inventory first, then a dictionary and a data sample for the datasets they care about.
How MON$TER helps
You don't need a perfect spreadsheet to start. In a free review we help you map what you hold, spot what has licensing value and decide what stays out. Published MON$TER ranges: an exclusive one-time sale typically lands at $50K-$1M, and a non-exclusive recurring license typically runs $300K-$3M per year. No amount is guaranteed and not every company qualifies. Buyers see a description first, never your raw data. Get a free valuation at /estimate/ or start at Business Data.