Asset managers are looking for ways to mine alternative data sets for investment ideas, recognizing...: Asset managers are looking for ways to mine alternative data sets for investment ideas, recognizing that stock pickers cannot rely on traditional research. An explosion in alternative data, ranging from satellite images to mobile geolocation data and unstructured text, has created an arms race among hedge funds and quantitative funds. Many firms have hired data scientists to dive into pools of data and to use machine learning algorithms to extract insights or predictive signals.