The LSE Directory / Alternative data
BattleFin operates an alternative-data discovery and transaction platform for institutional investors rather than originating data itself. Its core product, Ensemble, is a searchable marketplace and catalog of alternative datasets (geolocation, transaction, app-usage and similar sources) that hedge funds and asset managers browse, evaluate and license; vendor products are scored against a standardized Data Quality Scorecard covering metadata summary, univariate and bivariate analysis, time-series analysis and data completeness. Alongside the marketplace, BattleFin runs Discovery Day, a recurring conference series held in cities including Miami, New York, London and Montauk that pre-schedules 15 to 25 minute one-on-one meetings between vetted data providers and qualified buy-side attendees. The firm's differentiation from purely self-serve data catalogs is its live, curated-matchmaking model: rather than just listing datasets online, it structures in-person meeting schedules and data-science-competition tracks around each Discovery Day event, and layers a standardized scoring framework on top of vendor submissions. In December 2024 it acquired Exabel, an analytics platform built by mathematicians and data scientists that harmonizes raw alternative datasets into ready-to-use, alpha-oriented signals, extending BattleFin from pure discovery into post-purchase analytics for the same buy-side customer base. BattleFin was founded in 2012 by Tim Harrington, who serves as CEO, and Marc LoPresti, now the firm's Chief Market Strategist and a former New York Stock Exchange floor trader for Lehman Brothers; it is headquartered in Rowayton, Connecticut. It announced a strategic partnership with Jefferies in 2018, and in December 2024 raised $4 million from investors AWC and Jefferies alongside prior backing from London Stock Exchange Group, concurrent with the Exabel acquisition. At the time of that acquisition the company cited a network of 800-plus data-vendor partners and 300-plus financial-institution clients; its current site cites over 1,100 buyers and a catalog of more than 3,000 datasets. The Exabel deal and the December 2024 funding were positioned around adding AI-driven analytics on top of discovery, letting buy-side clients extract more value from datasets they already license. BattleFin previewed the combined Ensemble AI and Exabel product at its Miami Discovery Day in January 2025 and continued the event series into 2026 with further Miami and New York editions.
