Where Did You Say “Put the Semantic Layer”?
February 10, 2021
Eager to add value to their pricey cloud data-warehouses, cloud vendors are making a case for processing analytics right on their platforms. Providers of independent analytics platforms note such an approach falls short for the many companies that have data in multiple places. VentureBeat reports, “Contest for Control Over the Semantic Layer for Analytics Begins in Earnest.” Writer Michael Vizard tells us:
“Naturally, providers of analytics and business intelligence (BI) applications are treating data warehouses as another source from which to pull data. Snowflake, however, is making a case for processing analytics in its data warehouse. For example, in addition to processing data locally within its in-memory server, Alteryx is now allowing end users to process data directly in the Snowflake cloud. At the same time, however, startups that enable end users to process data using a semantic layer that spans multiple clouds are emerging. A case in point is Kyligence, a provider of an analytics platform for Big Data based on open source Apache Kylin software.”
Alteryx itself acknowledges the limitations of data-analysis solutions that reside on one cloudy platform. The write-up reports:
“Alteryx remains committed to a hybrid cloud strategy, chief marketing officer Sharmila Mulligan said. Most organizations will have data that resides both in multiple clouds and on-premises for years to come. The idea that all of an organization’s data will reside in a single data warehouse in the cloud is fanciful, Mulligan said. ‘Data is always going to exist in multiple platforms,’ she said. ‘Most organizations are going to wind up with multiple data warehouses.’”
Kyligence is one firm working to capitalize on that decentralization. Its analytics platform pulls data from multiple platforms in an online analytical processing database. The company has raised nearly $50 million, and is releasing an enterprise edition of Apache Kylin that will run on AWS and Azure. It remains to be seen whether data warehouses can convince companies to process data on their platforms, but the push is clearly part of the current trend—the pursuit of a never-ending flow of data.
Cynthia Murrell, February 10, 2021
Comments
-
- Subscribe to Beyond Search
Feature archive
News archive
-
