From my experience the most common use of Big Data is to 1. Provide confirmation bias for decision makers to feel more confident and comfortable. This happens

From my experience the most common use of Big Data is to 1. Provide confirmation bias for decision makers to feel more confident and comfortable. This happens in the translation layer from Data to Information, and the data can support several possible points of view depending on what questions are asked of it. 2. Provide small adjustments to someone's existing plan. Maybe someone was planning on building fifty connivance stores in a region, but they found data that local market can actually support eighty so they use the data to justify increasing their budget. Maybe they were planning on selling five types of pepsi in their store, but the data shows they should sell six. This type of adjustment is usually used as an excuse to increase capital expenditure, or provide guidance on how to allocate existing resources. 3. (Most rare) Data is used to provide novel insights that give a large compeitive advantage. This is the "Money Ball" and "Big Short" sort of situation. One thing America is very good at is to provide a compeitive marketplace where a smaller participant has a shot if they are good enough. It's exceedingly rare to see an incumbent use big data in a novel way.