Los Angeles has announced that it is allowing researchers access to an unprecedented amount of smart city data, linking its computational resources to the 100Gbps California Research and Education Network (CalREN), and allowing members access to what is thought to be the largest store of city data. This open data, open provided you are a CalREN member at least, would enable businesses to estimate and model how their technologies might effect the city, and from there, could base business models and investment pitches on the outcomes. Open data is a big deal for the IoT. The value inherent in an IoT deployment is usually found in the data it generates, not the physical object itself. Services rely on the data…