IBM Sells The Weather Company As Each Grows In New Directions

IBM Sells The Weather Company As Each Grows In New Directions

Under a recently signed agreement, IBM will sell The Weather Company to technology investment firm Francisco Partners for an undisclosed amount. The transaction will include The Weather Channel mobile app and websites (Weather.com, Weather Underground and Storm Radar), as well as The Weather Company's enterprise data solutions and forecasting science and technology platform. IBM will retain its Environmental Intelligence Suite, which will continue to use data from The Weather Company, as well as NASA satellites. The sale is slated to close by April 2024, pending regulatory approvals and other standard processes. With this sale, IBM and The Weather Company will move in different directions, each developing and promoting new capabilities.

IBM is sharpening its business focus on software, cloud services and AI. As part of this strategy, the firm will continue to leverage its Environmental Intelligence Suite within its AI offerings. The platform provides monitoring and prediction information to inform planning for and response to weather events and climate change, as well as carbon management tools. Building on these capabilities, IBM has developed a new geospatial foundation model - to be rolled out later this year as part of IBM's watsonx enterprise AI platform - that converts satellite data into high resolution maps of climate and environmental changes. Selling The Weather Company while promoting this foundation model aligns with IBM's commitment to new AI solutions - an area in which the tech giant is not alone. Many vendors - including carbon management and accounting platform Persefoni and climate resilience tech platform ClimateAi, both of which have recently raised large amounts of capital - are currently seeking to enhance their AI capabilities, while, more generally, AI tools are growing in popularity across business functions.

For its part, Francisco Partners has indicated that it will expand The Weather Company's offerings beyond forecasting. It plans to develop new tools to assess weather impacts - initially focusing on health and wellbeing - and provide actionable insights to businesses. Although the specifics remain to be seen, this could help meet demand for decision-relevant metrics that aid individuals' and organizations' response to weather and climate change.

As IBM and The Weather Company part ways, we expect both to play a role in the booming market for climate risks digital solutions (see Verdantix Market Size And Forecast: Climate Risk Digital Solutions 2021-2027 (Global)). Verdantix will continue our coverage of this area with upcoming reports on carbon management platforms, climate risk software and climate change consulting. Stay tuned for more research on the rapidly growing climate risk solutions market.

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