Last checked: 7 October 2026. For companies, not individuals.
Freight brokers, 3PLs, distributors and field-service operators spend their days on things that went wrong: a missed pickup, a short shipment, a vendor who did not deliver. The record of how your team fixed those problems is the part buyers describe wanting.
The Spirit figure was reported by ABC, TIME and others for one large airline in bankruptcy. It is context, not a benchmark for your company.
Plans are easy to write down. What AI systems still struggle with is the messy middle: deciding what to do when the plan breaks.
micro1 names this category directly. Its data partnerships page lists “Operations & logistics” among its example categories, described as “Operational SOPs, logistics processes, fulfillment workflows, inventory management, and internal operations” (as published, checked 7 October 2026). Grepped, which also pays individual professionals for their expertise, lists operations managers among the roles it is looking for, with “SOPs, scheduling, vendors” as the work. Mode lists billing and operations records among the kinds of data it buys, and names systems such as NetSuite, Zendesk, Monday.com and Slack.
Why would a lab care about a late truckload? Because an exception thread is a compact, complete piece of reasoning. It starts with a trigger, weighs options under time pressure, involves several parties, ends with a decision and often a lesson. Thousands of those, linked to the SOPs that were supposed to prevent them, show how operational judgment actually works. That is closer to what buyers call “decision-making patterns” than any policy manual on its own.
A carrier misses a pickup window, a dock reports damaged pallets, or a supplier ships short.
Dispatch checks what is at stake: the customer’s deadline, penalties, which lanes and loads are affected.
Re-tender, expedite, split the load, or reset expectations. The thread shows who chose what, and why.
Emails, Teams or Slack messages and tickets that keep three or four parties aligned while the fix happens.
Claim filed or closed, SOP updated, carrier scorecard changed. The loop that turns one bad day into a better process.
The most visible sale of operations records so far came from an airline. It is worth reading carefully before drawing conclusions for your own company.
In August 2026, ABC, TIME and others reported that Google agreed to pay $10 million in Spirit Airlines’ bankruptcy proceedings for Spirit’s internal data, including emails, Teams messages, spreadsheets and operations files, to train AI.
micro1 then made a rival offer of $12.5 million. micro1 later held a session with former Spirit employees and said it pursues “non-sensitive, non-consumer data” with third-party de-identification.
For the sources and the latest status we have checked, see the Spirit Airlines data sale case. This page does not state an outcome.
You still operate. A company in liquidation has no future customers to protect. You do, and your customer and carrier contracts still bind you.
Your people are still there. Staff whose messages are in scope will notice. Telling them first is part of doing this well.
Scale and context differ. Years of records from a large national airline, sold in a court process, do not tell you what a 60-person 3PL’s archive is worth. Published ranges are ranges; “up to” is not an average.
Exclusivity matters more. A seller with no future can sign anything. You may want to sell a different slice later.
Operations records are full of other people: customers, consignees, drivers, vendors. Most of the work is deciding where those people stop being part of the dataset.
Logistics firms often have more people on the dock and on the road than at desks. The published rules are worded around employees and office staff, so count carefully.
| Program | Published company payout | Published eligibility | Note for operations companies |
|---|---|---|---|
| micro1 Enterprise Data Partnership | “$100k+ qualified”, “$500k+ large-scale”, “$1M+ highly unique” | 30+ employees, mature operations, documented processes, modern software tools, primarily English; U.S. prioritized, then other Western markets | Lists operations and logistics among its example categories. |
| Mode company data | “$100K to $5M” | 20+ full-time U.S. office employees; several years of records the company owns; U.S.-based teams strongest fit | Its calculator asks for desk and non-desk employees separately. Ask how warehouse and driver headcount is treated. |
| Grepped | “$20K to $5M” | Any vertical; also pays individual professionals for expertise | Lists operations managers (“SOPs, scheduling, vendors”) among the roles it seeks. |
Last checked 7 October 2026. Sources: each program’s own website (micro1 data partnerships page, data.mode.inc, grepped.ai). Figures are published ranges, not offers. Miro Advisory also publishes indicative ranges for operating datasets ($100K to $1M+); it is not covered by the buttons below.
Independent site. Some links are referral links: if your company signs with a buyer through them, the buyer may pay us a fee. You are not charged, and we never see your data.
A 90-person distributor with 25 people in the office and 65 in the warehouse may look eligible on one program’s wording and not on another’s. Enter both numbers in the eligibility checker and keep the answer the buyer gives you in writing. The full comparison lists every published term side by side.
There is no single logistics data law. The limits come from what you signed and whose data you hold.
General information, not legal advice. Talk to your own lawyer before you sign.
A written scope lets several buyers look at the same thing. It has no price, because pricing only happens after a buyer reviews the data.
| Headcount | 64 full-time staff: 34 in the office (brokerage desk, customer service, accounting) and 30 in the warehouse. Both numbers are given to every buyer. |
|---|---|
| Systems in scope | Outlook and Microsoft Teams (operations mailboxes and channels only), SharePoint (SOPs), Zendesk (customer tickets), NetSuite (approval workflows). The transportation management system is not on the buyers’ published source lists, so the company asks first. |
| Date range | 2018 to 2025. |
| Included | Exception threads and tickets with every customer, carrier, driver and employee replaced by consistent pseudonyms; SOPs and escalation playbooks; carrier scorecard procedures; receiving and cycle-count workflows. |
| Excluded | Rate confirmations and pricing, driver contacts and locations, consumer delivery addresses, injury claims, HR files, direct messages, two shippers whose contracts forbid reuse, and all government freight. |
| Before any sample leaves | A manifest of systems, dates, record counts and exclusions goes to more than one buyer. Samples follow only under NDA, after counsel signs off on the exclusion list. |
Operations companies vary more in shape than in size. The split between desk staff and field staff decides how the published rules apply.
A last-mile courier with 6 office staff and 12 drivers. It is below Mode’s published 20+ office-employee minimum and micro1’s 30+. Most of its records are consumer addresses and driver locations, which stay out anyway. Grepped publishes no company size line and also pays individual professionals, so an experienced dispatcher’s expertise may be the more realistic route.
An industrial distributor with 40 people in purchasing, customer service and inventory control, and 70 in the warehouse. The office count clears Mode’s published floor and total headcount clears micro1’s. Inventory workflows, vendor coordination, returns handling and NetSuite approval chains are the candidates. Customer price lists and consumer return addresses stay out.
A field service and fleet maintenance operator with 90 office staff and 330 technicians and drivers, running ServiceNow and Monday.com. It clears both published minimums. Its dispatch archive is large. Scheduling decisions and parts-shortage escalations can be scoped in. Technician locations and customer site access details cannot.
List every source before you talk to a buyer. The manifest you build from this table is what you share first, not the data.
| Record type | Typical system | Usually includable? | Why |
|---|---|---|---|
| SOPs and escalation matrices | SharePoint, Google Drive, Confluence | Usually yes | Your own process writing, with little personal data. |
| Exception email threads | Outlook, Gmail | Often, after pseudonymizing | The core decision record, but full of names and spot rates. |
| Dispatch and operations chat | Microsoft Teams, Slack | Process channels after review | Real-time decisions; direct messages stay out. |
| Customer service tickets | Zendesk, ServiceNow | Often, after scrubbing | Investigation, fix and reply in one place. |
| Project and task boards | Asana, Monday.com | Usually yes | Shows sequencing, ownership and follow-through. |
| ERP approvals and reconciliations | NetSuite, QuickBooks | Process records only | Customer lists and pricing are excluded. |
| TMS and WMS event logs | Transportation and warehouse systems | Ask first | Not on the buyers’ published source lists, and often full of addresses. |
| Telematics and GPS history | Fleet tracking tools | Generally no | The location of identifiable drivers. |
| Rate confirmations and contracts | Email, document storage | No | Confidential pricing covered by agreements. |
| Cargo and injury claims | Email, claims files | Rarely, and only after review | Insurance, injury and third-party details. |
Each item below has stopped a deal late in review somewhere. Answer them on paper first.
One reported airline price in a bankruptcy says little about a regional operator. Anchor on published ranges and real offers.
Event logs carry consignee addresses and driver identities. Scope fields first, then export.
A 3PL holds inventory data on behalf of clients. Treat it as theirs until your agreements say otherwise.
Exception emails often quote spot rates. Excluding rate confirmations is not enough if the numbers sit in the replies.
Map screenshots, proof-of-delivery photos and BOL scans leak what the text scrub removed.
Independent contractors are not employees. Do not count them toward a minimum without the buyer’s written answer.
These apply to any buyer and any agreement. They are not claims about a named program.
Some say so in writing. micro1 lists Operations and logistics among its example categories, naming operational SOPs, logistics processes, fulfillment workflows and inventory management (as published, checked 7 October 2026). That is a statement of interest, not a promise that any given company will be accepted or paid.
No. The $10 million figure reported in August 2026 was for the internal data of a large airline, sold in bankruptcy proceedings. It shows that operations records can attract bids. It is not a price list for a freight broker or a regional 3PL. Nobody can price your data without reviewing it.
Check with the buyer. Mode lists 20+ full-time U.S. office employees and asks separately about non-desk employees in its calculator. micro1 lists 30+ employees. Neither page we checked spells out how non-desk staff are treated for eligibility.
Not always, but it is the main work. Names, phone numbers, addresses and rates usually need to be removed or replaced with consistent pseudonyms, and some customer contracts may bar reuse entirely. A buyer de-identifying the copy does not settle what your own contracts allow.
Not necessarily. Records you keep on behalf of clients may be governed by your service agreements, and the client may own them. Leave client inventory and order data out of scope until your lawyer has read those agreements. Your own SOPs and internal coordination records are a simpler place to start.
It depends on how the buyer counts. Mode lists 20+ full-time U.S. office employees, and micro1 lists 30+ employees (as published, checked 7 October 2026). A company with a small office and a large driver team should ask in writing before applying. Grepped publishes no company size line and also pays individual professionals.
Mode publishes that it generally expects about three months from the first conversation through payment, and practitioners cite 60 to 90 days to close. Large email and ticket archives take longer to scope. Treat any promise of a few weeks with care.
Enter office and non-desk headcount, years of records and the systems you use. The checker runs in your browser, stores nothing and shows which published rule decided each result.