Here’s why IBM wants to become a weather forecaster!

The reason behind IBM wanting to acquire The WeatherCompany can be summed up in this – Weather affects everything!

According to sources, the Big Blue has allegedly invested over $2 billion towards buying the data and digital assets of The Weather Company, also known to own the Weather Channel and Weather.com.

This might seem like an odd pairing, but the Weather Company has already made up its mind to sell all its weather data services, which will be channelled to the cloud-based Watson. IBM will have the ability to take full advantage of this partnership by controlling the app that is installed in millions of smart phones. This adds more hats to IBM’s wears.

According to New York Times, the Weather Company’s data impacts everything, ranging from retailers and insurance companies to the aerospace sector. This exchange could help develop new use cases for Watson.

The in-house forecasting team, WSI, can be the main areas of interest for IBM. The team creates complex projections based on the climate data sets for government and corporate giants. WSI could offer a whole new market for Watson-related solutions and help boost IBM’s analytical initiatives.

All in all, this partnership means more power to IBM!