DTN is known for its accurate meteorological forecasting[1][2][3] and large network of weather stations,[4] its market analysis services, and its early use of radio and satellite systems to transmit reports to its Midwestern consumers.

[6][7] On 9 April 1984 the company created a new subsidiary incorporated under the name Scoular Information Services with the goal of improving communications with farmers.

The project was led by Omaha native Roger Brodersen, Scoular's chief operating officer and the executive who supervised new-project development and corporate acquisitions for the company.

Monthly fees were $19.50 for 65 videotext pages of market quotes, grain and livestock information, commentary, weather, and reports.

[12] In September, Dataline partnered with a subsidiary of ConAgra to add an "electronic catalog" feature to their information feed, allowing subscribers to browse farm supplies, equipment, and other products.

[8] The company, commonly identified simply as DTN, expanded rapidly through the late 1980s and early 1990s; its operating cash flow grew roughly 30% each year beginning in 1989 and by 1993 was $12.9M.

[16] Since April 1998, DTN had been seeking an organization to buy the 1300-employee company, but after 11 months had not found anyone willing to pay a price that the board felt was appropriate, so in mid-March 1999 founder Roger Brodersen called off the search for a buyer.

[21] In April 2000, the New York City-based private equity firm Veronis Suhler Stevenson agreed to buy out DTN for $451M, including $91M in debt.

[22] Veronis implemented a new strategy by splitting DTN into four separate divisions: agriculture, energy, weather, and financial services.

He gradually reduced staff to 675, eliminated redundancies, and pushed a new strategy of selling proprietary data at a premium price.

[25] In 2007 it acquired the majority of the Edmond, Oklahoma company WeatherBank,[26] integrating its energy, transportation, public safety, and agriculture weather forecasting customers into Meteorlogix.

The deal for an undisclosed sum supported Time Warner's strategy of shedding smaller publications to focus on its larger magazine properties[27] and DTN's mission of providing agricultural information.

DTN at the time of the acquisition had about 700 employees, 700,000 subscribers, and annual revenues of approximately $180M, with about 90% of its sales derived from its subscription-based services.

Schneider announced in early 2011 that it had reached a deal to acquire Telvent, and in August received regulatory approval to complete the €1.4B acquisition.

[27][52] DTN generates weather reports, forecasts, and analysis aimed at consumers in seven sectors: aviation, marine, utilities, renewable energy, transportation, sports, and construction/public safety.

Forecasts and reports are based on large data sets that combine proprietary information from DTN's network of 6,000 weather stations with other global content sources.

In October 2024 a technical fault affecting the supplying of data to the United Kingdom's BBC Weather service caused the latter's website and app to incorrectly forecast wind speeds of over 15,000 mph (24,000 km/h) and air temperatures exceeding 400 °C (750 °F).

DTN sells streaming market data, tickers, news, historical analysis, stock and option quotes, and other related services.

DTN terminals would display information on a page-by-page basis, and supported the optional attachment of a line printer to create hard copy reports.

The basic package contained 40 pages of information, including charts, commentary, news, futures quotes, and weather; the subscription price in 1986 was $210/year.