AI labs are buying data from dead startups to train their models
MIT Technology Review reports that a new cohort of companies is selling defunct startups' digital assets to AI training buyers. SimpleClosure's Asset Hub helps founders sell code and workspace data from Google, Notion, Figma and Slack; CEO Dori Yona says it has handled more than 150 deals and expects to return over $10 million to startups by the end of 2026, with 47% of deals now including code or data sales, while rival Sunset is also growing its data resale business. The report says Google outbid data company Mercor in August in Spirit Airlines' bankruptcy, paying $10 million for about 100 million emails, 500 million Teams messages and 176,000 employee records, while firms such as Surge AI use such archives to build reinforcement-learning environments. Real archives avoid common errors in synthetic worlds, but the piece notes no company has published tests comparing real-world data training with alternatives, and pricing varies widely because valuations rest on uncertain "research theses". Privacy advocates and attorneys question the sales, and the report says proceeds typically go to senior creditors and investors rather than employees.
With public and synthetic data nearing their limits, real corporate archives are becoming a training resource, yet privacy, consent and who-profits questions remain largely unregulated.
When Keelan Miskell began winding down his crypto startup this year, he didn’t think its data was worth much: the users were anonymous, the company just a few years old. But he’s since turned the firm’s digital archives into real money. He’s netted roughly $25,000 for his code base and a still-pending amount (likely around $15,000) for the workspace data in Google, Notion, Figma, and Slack. “At least all that stuff we were doing for two and a half years is worth something to someone somewhere,” he says.
The sale was brokered by a company called SimpleClosure, part of a new growth sector in tech: businesses catering to dying startups. Estimates from Carta and AngelList show shutdowns rising between 26% and 56% annually in recent years, and an end-of-life ecosystem—including coaches, “death doulas,” and firms that help handle the legal, tax, and operational headaches of going belly-up—has emerged. Now tech undertakers are selling the data remains to AI labs.
SimpleClosure added data sales to its services in April. Its Asset Hub platform helps founders sell their code and workspace data—emails, chats, documents. Buyers include foundation AI labs, vendors that construct simulated workspaces for AI training, and mature tech companies building their own models. Asset Hub has handled over 150 deals and expects to return over $10 million to startups by the end of 2026. CEO Dori Yona has seen these transactions, once rare and “somewhat taboo,” become increasingly routine, with 47% of SimpleClosure deals now including code or data sales.
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