Business
From Recession Survivor to Industry Pioneer: Ed Lewis's Data Revolution
Global Banking & Finance Review®
Company
Ed Lewis, a native Houstonian and the founder of Industrial Info Resources (IIR), was stranded on the West Coast when Hurricane Harvey hit in 2017. Back in Houston, IIR’s head office was offline, but the market didn’t pause. “My researchers’ phones were ringing red-hot,” Lewis recalls, as customers demanded specifics—where damage had occurred, when plants might be back online, and what could be hit next. In response, IIR’s team went straight to the source, validated what was actually happening at the asset level, and delivered answers customers could act on.
Harvey also exposed a new need for his company. IIR already had the plant and asset database and the human network, but customers needed a way to map facilities while tracking the storm’s path. That pressure became a catalyst. Working across IIR’s technology team, a third-party weather service provider, and its researchers, the company built the IIR Disaster Impact Tracker.
That crisis-tested standard—verify first, publish second—wasn’t something Lewis discovered in 2017. It was the reason he founded Industrial Info Resources in the first place. In 1983, the recession left him unemployed while he was married with a young family. “It was very much a case of sink or swim. I chose to swim,” he said.
Lewis had been involved in construction, where unemployment rose to over 24% at its height, and he brought a background in selling construction and project management solutions. Instead of guessing at what the market needed, he visited old clients and asked what blocked them from pursuing new business. The consistent answer he got was a lack of verified information they could trust and rely on.
For Lewis, value was never about more information. It was about information people could use with confidence. “Successful innovation comes from innovating things that have value,” he says. Looking back, IIR began with only five people and grew to over 500 staff across continents, with offices in every major region of the world.
Lewis calls the IIR model “surveillance-grade” because it is active and asset-level. Their researchers connect directly with owners, operators, and engineers, then double-verify details before publishing changes in what is being constructed, added, delayed, or decommissioned across energy, power, chemicals, manufacturing, data centers, mining, and infrastructure. Information may be plentiful, but for Lewis, trust is a rare commodity, and IIR has earned its reputation through the hard work of validation.
That same insistence on doing it right shows up in how he leads: progress requires constant adjustment, or “trimming one’s sails.” He believes that excellence only happens when the people closest to the work have a voice. “There is no point in hiring the best people you can, but then holding them back from coming forward with their ideas,” he says. And when conditions get hard, Lewis believes leadership must be practical, not performative. “Don’t ask others to do what you wouldn’t be willing to do yourself.”
Those principles weren’t formed in comfort. They were sharpened in the early years, when innovation cost money IIR didn’t always have. Lewis admits they spent more than they made at first, which forced a hard financial rule into place: “Don’t spend what you don’t have.” Over time, he learned to favor small, incremental improvements over radical, expensive swings, and he built a culture that takes missteps as fuel rather than failure. “We’ve built a culture where mistakes are just opportunities to learn little lessons,” he says. “Innovation is the father of necessity.”
Global expansion was Lewis’s biggest strategic leap, and it came as the world emerged from the Great Recession of 2008–2009. IIR was already a respected regional brand then, but customers needed a truly global provider at the same standard. Many were still with IIR some 40-plus years later. “Our customers needed us to grow, and we knew we would get the support from them once we did,” Lewis shares.
Now, IIR is exploring AI, and Lewis draws two lines. First, intent. He says, “We are not using AI to reduce our work staff — we are using AI to empower them.” Second, inputs: IIR trains specialized models on proprietary intelligence, not generic data. That matters in markets where projects are announced, revised, delayed, or shelved, and where capacity shifts constantly. “Trusted data is to AI as gasoline is to an engine — without it, performance falls flat,” Lewis notes. “Even the most advanced AI is only as strong as the data that feeds it.”
He frames the shift as three distinct eras. The information age was about collecting and distributing data. The knowledge age raised the bar by forcing organizations to interpret that data and understand what it means. Now, Lewis argues, we’ve entered the answer age, where the goal isn’t more inputs but more decision-ready direction.
In markets where projects are revised midstream, supply chains ripple across regions, and policy or geopolitical shocks can change economics overnight, companies need to know what’s changing, why it matters, and what move to make next.
The IIR’s Disaster Impact Tracker reflects that answer-age requirement. It maps verified facility updates against a storm’s path, and it supports traders who track supply-side interruptions, industrial teams that spot service opportunities, and insurers that feed risk models. Lewis values geospatial analytics because it turns location-based data into visual, actionable insight.
Moreover, customers use IIR to make timing calls, with heat maps, regional investment views, data feeds for analysis tools, and reporting that surfaces signals early.
Lewis puts the stakes plainly: “In a world where market conditions can shift overnight and uncertainty is the only constant, data is no longer just a commodity — it’s a strategic imperative.” In capital-intensive markets, weak intelligence creates delayed visibility, costly mistakes, and decisions built on the wrong foundation.
As AI continues to lower barriers to access, quality assurance still decides outcomes. “For finance professionals globally, this is not a theoretical but a practical distinction. It’s a matter of market responsiveness and forecasting,” says Lewis.
Lewis still starts with what launched IIR: listen to clients, solve what matters, and keep earning trust. According to him, “We started from humble beginnings and have never forgotten where we came from. But we definitely don’t take our success for granted, and complacency is not in our DNA.”
This message returns to the storm metaphor that shaped IIR’s innovation from Hurricane Harvey: “We help our customers find those waves of opportunities that will help them weather any storm that might come their way.”
Data analytics involves examining data sets to draw conclusions about the information they contain. It is used in various industries to improve decision-making and optimize performance.
Innovation in finance refers to the introduction of new ideas, products, or methods that enhance financial services, improve efficiency, and meet changing customer needs.
A financial management system is a software solution that helps organizations manage their financial operations, including budgeting, accounting, and reporting.
Geospatial analytics is the collection, analysis, and visualization of data related to geographic locations. It helps businesses make informed decisions based on location-based insights.
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