Entries from August 2013 ↓

The Data Day, A few days: August 23-30 2013

Couchbase raises $25m. 10gen becomes MongoDB. And more.

And that’s the data day, today.

Towards a practical definition of ‘big data’

Information Week has published an interesting interview with David McJannet, VP of marketing for Hortonworks, in which he discusses the limitations of existing definitions of ‘big data’ and proposes a more practical, business-oriented, definition.

…Big data is about “building new analytic applications based on new types of data, in order to better serve your customers and drive a better competitive advantage,” said McJannet.

This approach is in keeping with my recent reassessment of our communication in relation to big data, as I explained during our recent webinar “Big Data Reconsidered” (a replay of which is available here).

While volume, variety and velocity are common characteristics of the ‘big data’ projects we talk to clients about, they do not define their problems and initiatives in terms of volume, variety and velocity (or any other Vs).

Instead they are focused on business problems (e.g. churn analysis, fraud analysis) or functional challenges (e.g. processing and analysis of very large data sets in their entirety, stream processing of sensor and machine-generated data) that help deal with business problems.

Based on these ongoing conversations I would agree with McJannet that enterprises are looking for more a business-oriented definition of big data that focuses less on the nature of the data and more on the business outcomes.

For what it’s worth, and in the spirit of taking the conversation forward, below is the description of big data that we seem to have settled on:

‘Big Data’ is the realization of competitive advantage by storing, processing and analyzing data that was previously ignored due to the cost and functional limitations of traditional data management technologies.

Our description and McJannet’s are variations on a theme, both focusing on a key factor that is missing from most V-driven definitions: competitive advantage. However, since the baseline for conversation has been set by the 3Vs here’s the longer version which puts our description in context:

‘Big Data’ is the realization of competitive advantage by storing, processing and analyzing data that was previously ignored due to the cost and functional limitations of traditional data management technologies to handle its volume, velocity and variety.

The Data Day, A few days: August 15-22 2013

Hadoop as an engine for data integration. And more.

And that’s the data day, today.

Forthcoming webinar: NoSQL Technology and Real-time, Accurate Predictive Analytics

On August 29 at 10:00 am PT I’ll be taking part in a webinar in association with Objectivity entitled “Big Data: NoSQL Technology and Real-time, Accurate Predictive Analytics”.

The webinar will provide an overview of NoSQL database technology and, in particular, the role that graph databases have in the expanding analytics market.

I’ll be joined by Leon Guzenda, Founder, Objectivity, who will provide a brief overview of Objectivity, Inc and its products Objectivity/DB and InfiniteGraph, as well as J.C. Smart, Director Global Insight Laboratory, Georgetown University, who will explain how Georgetown University is taking advantage of Objectivity’s products to develop one of the most interconnected databases today – examining information from all types of sources worldwide in real-time.

For full details, and to register, click here.

The Data Day, A few days: August 8-14 2013

DBaaS drives next-generation database growth. CSC acquires Infochimps. And more

And that’s the data day, today.

The Data Day, A few days: August 1-7 2013

MySQL, NoSQL, NewSQL, DBaaS market sizing. And more

Forthcoming webinar: Big Data Reconsidered

Next Tuesday, August 13, 2013 at 1:00 PM – 2:00 PM EDT I’ll be presenting a 451 Research webinar entitled Big Data Reconsidered: Separating Hype from Reality for Hosting and Cloud Providers.

Big Data and the Cloud are two of the most hyped terms in the history of the IT industry, and together, would appear to provide opportunities for hosting and cloud providers to offer new revenue-generating services.

In this session I will go back to basics with a hype-free overview of Big Data and the opportunities it provides for hosting and cloud providers, while also previewing the Big Data-related sessions attendees can look forward to at HCTS 2013 in Las Vegas next month.

For more details and to register, click here.

Sizing the opportunities for MySQL, NoSQL, NewSQL and DBaaS

451 Research has recently published an update to our market sizing estimates for the MySQL ecosystem, NoSQL and NewSQL sectors, adding coverage of the database-as-a-service market.

The report, Next-Generation Operational Databases: 2012-2016, can be found here and provides estimates for the size of the aggregate market and each market sector, as well as competitive landscape maps. It also includes a growth forecast for each sector, and highlights the opportunities and threats facing participating vendors.

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The key findings are also available in the a short, free presentation (registration required), which can be found here, and provides details of how the MySQL, NoSQL and DBaaS sectors are each expected to grow to generate revenue in excess of $1bn by 2016.