StraightTalk

Teradata’s unified data world is evolving

Traditionally identified with the enterprise data warehouse, Teradata has significantly broadened its product portfolio and positioning. With enterprise analytics no longer a monolithic world, Teradata offers an array of models optimized for different types of workloads, and increasingly, new styles such as exploratory analytics.

Oracle puts applications in the Fast Data lane

With Oracle’s X-3 generation of Exadata and Exalogic engineered-systems platforms significantly upping the amount of Flash (SSD) and memory (DRAM), Oracle is now cranking up the speed on its applications portfolio.

Actian goes on a Big Data acquisition spree

Actian, the vendor formerly known as Ingres, has suddenly put itself on the map through rapid-fire acquisitions of Pervasive Software, ParAccel, and Versant Software. The die was cast more than two years ago with the acquisition of Vectorwise, a fast, single-node analytic database.

Big Data must become a first-class citizen in the enterprise

Few topics have lately drawn more hype and scrutiny than Big Data. Having originated with Internet firms, Big Data has captured enterprise attention with examples that show how organizations, from public sector to financial services firms, telcos, and media derived insights that improved customer retention, operational efficiency, and risk mitigation.

EMC launches Pivotal cloud platform business

EMC has formed a new business called Pivotal, which aggregates Greenplum with pieces of VMware. Although EMC owns most of the company, smaller stakes are held by VMware and GE.

IBM introduces new analytic architecture

Nearing the first anniversary of its PureSystems product line, IBM is introducing a Hadoop appliance and making other Big Data-related announcements regarding its core database platforms. Although Hadoop announcements tend to grab the spotlight, the highlight of IBM’s announcements is a new hybrid columnar/in-memory architecture branded “BLU” that is initially targeted for the DB2 10.5 and Informix TimeSeries 12.1 platforms.

EMC Greenplum’s Pivotal HD: SQL and Hadoop worlds collide

The convergence of SQL and Hadoop has become a collision, with EMC Greenplum’s announcement this week of Pivotal HD. The new offering in essence packages the Greenplum MPP Advanced SQL platform and places it directly inside Hadoop’s HDFS. EMC Greenplum’s strategy is a good example of how Hadoop platform providers are using the SQL interface to differentiate themselves.

Intel hardware-optimizes Hadoop

One of the more surprising developments to come out of the Strata Big Data conference last week was Intel’s entry into the Hadoop market. While at first glance, it appears that there are more than enough Hadoop distributions on the market, Intel’s introduces hardware optimization that could significantly raise the bar on Hadoop performance demand. Besides increasing throughput, Intel’s optimization could make mass encryption of Hadoop data possible, closing a key security hole.

SAP brings Business Suite to HANA

Roughly a year into its release, SAP has finally brought its ERP business suite to the HANA in memory database platform. The release is the logical culmination of a process that began with HANA’s rollout for SAP Business Warehouse, followed last fall with support for SAP CRM Suite.

Big Data: what’s hot, what’s not according to the Twitter stream

Because (or in spite) of the hype, sentiment about Big Data vendors was generally bullish in 2012. The attention spilled over from IT to the business media. These were among the findings reported by DataSift, which conducted a retrospective analysis of vendor mentions on Twitter during 2012 for Ovum.