FactSet has partnered with alternative data platform Carbon Arc to integrate more than 500 data assets from over 60 providers into its Workstation and AI ecosystem, expanding the range of information available to investment professionals through existing research and analytical workflows.
Announced on 10 November, the agreement covers datasets spanning credit card transactions, retail foot traffic, digital advertising, ecommerce, web and app activity, and housing permits. The integration is designed to help analysts and portfolio managers assess consumer demand, monitor company performance and identify emerging market trends without having to source and integrate individual datasets independently.The offering will be available as an optional add-on through single sign-on, with access provided through FactSet Workstation and its Model Context Protocol (MCP) integrations with major cloud providers and AI developers. This will allow Carbon Arc’s datasets to be incorporated into both conventional investment research and AI-powered analytical processes.
Founded in 2021, Carbon Arc operates a platform that aggregates hard-to-source company and economic information, applying a compliance layer before making datasets available to institutional users. Its role in the partnership extends beyond distribution to providing a governed mechanism through which external data can be incorporated into FactSet’s broader intelligence offering.
John Costigan, Co-Head of Product at FactSet, says the integration significantly broadens the information available to clients. “By integrating Carbon Arc’s catalogue of alternative data assets, we are meaningfully expanding the depth and breadth of insights our clients can unlock with FactSet Intelligence.”
The partnership reflects a broader shift in the alternative data market towards embedding external information directly into established investment platforms. For institutional users, this approach can reduce the operational complexity associated with managing multiple supplier relationships, integrating disparate data feeds and maintaining the infrastructure needed to support their use.
It also builds on FactSet’s wider strategy of making financial information accessible through AI-enabled workflows. In a September interview with Market & Alt Data Insight, Gerard Miller, SVP, Agentic Strategy at FactSet, highlighted the growing importance of data quality, provenance, entity resolution and semantic context as investment firms begin incorporating AI agents into research and portfolio management processes.
Miller argued that data providers increasingly need to support the infrastructure and contextual information required for AI systems to interpret and combine datasets reliably. The Carbon Arc integration extends the range of external information available within that environment, potentially supporting more sophisticated research combining traditional financial metrics with real-world economic signals.
The announcement also follows FactSet’s recent expansion into private markets analytics through partnerships with Hamilton Lane and Nasdaq Private Market, reflecting a wider effort to incorporate differentiated third-party content into its institutional platform.
For alternative data providers, distribution through established financial platforms offers access to existing institutional customers, although wider availability also raises questions about how individual datasets can retain their competitive value.
As AI-powered research tools become more widely adopted, the ability to combine proprietary investment processes with relevant, appropriately governed external information is likely to become increasingly important. FactSet’s latest partnership illustrates how established financial data platforms are positioning themselves as intermediaries between specialised data suppliers and the investment workflows increasingly consuming their information.
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