IBM announced in July that its research has already led the team to create models that are 30% more accurate in predicting cloud cover than any other models out there. Even before the deal, IBM already had lots of weather data to play with. The Physical Analytics team is using information from essentially every weather report ever disseminated in history to try to build a system to more accurately predict the weather. The team, lead by Hendrik Hamann, is trying to build this database to figure out when it’s going to get cloudy so that solar energy generating companies can more accurately plan what resources will be available when. Watson is designed to literally crunch all of the data it can get its hands on.

IBM brought big data to the hardcourt. The Weather Company acquisition has set IBM up to do the same thing for weather. Weather Analytics empowers brands to make better decisions based on the weather with data and analytics packages that are easily available in cloud-based exchanges. Now, thanks to IBM’s data analysis, we know in an instant the likely velocity of the second serves the player is going to make, and the likelihood that the serve will be in, given the player’s history in the tournament, against that particular player, and on that surface. Weather is, and has always been, a proven and privacy friendly predictor of consumer behavior - but can be challenging to action on given its complexity. Commentators no longer simply talk about how many second serves a player has had in a match. Since IBM got involved in tennis-it powers the point tracking and analytics at the US Open and the other Grand Slam tournaments-it’s shaped the way we think about the sport. IBM also already partnered with the Weather Company earlier this year to provide cities with a disaster management tool as the Atlantic hurricane season began. Meanwhile, in the Physical Analytics Lab at the company’s Yorktown Heights, NY, research facility, a team has been working with the Department of Energy on technology that could one day (fairly soon) accurately predict when clouds will form (and therefore, rain). Since the 1990s, IBM has collaborated with the US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) to help the government with short-term forecasting models. Search and analyze structured, unstructured, internal, external and public content to uncover trends and patterns. IBM has actually been working on weather for years. '>Watson Explorer is a cognitive search and content analysis platform that gives you access to insights from all the data you care about, so you can drive business performance and growth. “We’ve known about clouds for a long time,” Kenney added. All this will be a perfect data set to run through Watson and IBM’s cloud computing prowess to mine for new insights on weather patterns that impact our daily lives.

Weather Company CEO David Kenney said it has ”billions of data points from sensors”-in fact, three billion weather forecast reference points, as well as weather data from more than 40 million smartphones and 50,000 daily airplane flights.

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