There exists today little motivation for researchers to share their research data, which is their source of scientific reputation. This paper addresses this major challenge for open science and identifies alternative business models for researchers to open their data repositories for external users. Our research question is “How to open big data in a way that it can be transferred to sustainable business cases that bring value to data owners as well as potential external users?” Our paper is based on a case study of a Finnish foundation and its currently closed database. As key findings, we identify opportunities, barriers and possible solutions for opening this database based on 11 interviews with key stakeholders. Our research contributes to open science literature through illustrating how to open big data in a way that brings value to both data owners and external users.
