Observer Research Foundation
bhineet Nayyar, our Senior Associate - Research and Policy Engagement, attended a closed-door roundtable on ‘Decentralised Data Marketplace' organized on the sidelines of the India AI Impact Summit 2026 by the Oberver Research Foundation on 17/02/2026 in Delhi. The event was organized by ORF to gather ecosystem feedback on their 'Decentralised Data Marketplace' - a hypothetical marketplace that uses a decentralised network architecture for global discovery while preserving local control, and a contributor ecosystem that enables data contribution by enabling technical solutions and strengthening community support. This discussion focused on the opportunities and challenges of such a marketplace that could enable contributors to monetize via flexible terms, reduce discovery costs for users, and foster fair value-sharing.Abhineet’s inputs on the marketplace thesis centered on two dimensions: conceptual gaps and operational limitations.