Bloomberg has launched a global portal providing interactive, continuously updated industry research and data from a team of more than 100 professionals. Bloomberg Industries (BI) will cover over 100 industries in North America, Europe and Asia from its hubs in New York, Princeton, New Jersey, London and Hong Kong, providing analysis and thematic insights alongside the firm's industry data, news and analytics.

Bloomberg says that the senior analysts - with an average of 17 years' experience at top buy- and sell-side firms - will create and manage in-depth data and analysis for each industry's drivers, metrics, competitors, themes and earnings. In addition, the portal aggregates information from more than 200 third-party providers.

However, the company stresses that BI will not include stock recommendations and is " designed to complement " rather than compete with the work of traditional equity analysts. This is the latest major feature to be included in the Bloomberg Professional Service , which has more than 310,000 subscribers worldwide.

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This sounds as if it could be really useful, but, for the corporate treasury department, it is often difficult to justify the cost when so much free information is included in FX dealing platforms and investment portals.