Q4 2024 Research Highlights

It’s time for another quarterly research drop. Here’s what we’ve been working on in Q4. Of course, being the end of the year, the coda where it all comes together is AWS Re:Invent. But there’s more. We’re releasing our takeaways from AWS, IBM, Oracle, Teradata, and probably the most established database player you’re never heard of, InterSystems. Overriding themes focused on new cross-cloud partnerships, rationalizing cloud services into solutions, and in one case (guess which), a database provider just starting to get their feet wet in the cloud.

AWS brings Data and AI Together
The shot heard round the (data + AI) world was AWS’s unveiling of a rethought SageMaker. A year ago, we called for AWS to start what we termed a “new day.” The great thing about AWS is that has lots of services to choose from – several hundred of them. AWS’s advantage is in our opinion its stiffest challenge. And nowhere is the challenge arguably greater than with data, analytics, and AI, which are increasingly coming together, Operational analytics is blurring the line with transactions, and on the analytics side, machine learning in the form of predictive analytics is increasingly insinuating itself into the types of BI queries that business users rely on for making decisions. And then there’s generative AI for making queries conversational and bridging the gap with texts, documents, messages and other un- or semi-structured data that can add context to traditional BI queries. AWS has offered multiple channels between Redshift ML, Athena, and SageMaker for disparate audiences. SageMaker Studio brings this all together in a manner that is transformational for AWS. Click here: AWS brings Data and AI Together

IBM AI & Hybrid Cloud: 2024 progress report
IBM is a household name that is drawing newfound respect. Under Arvind Krishna’s leadership, years of declining growth have reversed, with key to that being the Red hat acquisition that closed roughly five years ago. Red Hat has been instrumental in both of IBM’s current key focuses: hybrid and multi-cloud and, of course, AI. Red Hat provided the missing piece that transformed IBM’s hybrid and multicloud strategy from vision to platform. Enabled by fortuitous timing with emergence of Kubernetes (K8s) as de facto standard for cloud orchestration, not to mention Red hat’s prominence in the open source world, Red Hat OpenShift has become the leading third party K8s platform for organizations seeking to avoid hyperscaler lock-in. Undre IBM’s watch, Red Hat’s business has doubled while sales of OpenShift have grown 10x. With AI, IBM not surprisingly is all-in with data, development, and lifecycle management and governance, not to mention its own Granite models that are being engineered for compactness. Red Hat was involved here as well, incubating the idea for InstructLab, IBM’s emerging approach for streamlining gen AI model training. Granite is differentiated, not only by footprint (others will get there as well), but also for its unusual degree of transparency that is enabling IBM to be one of the few that will indemnify its customers. Click here: IBM AI & Hybrid Cloud: 2024 progress report

Teradata VantageCloud hits inflection point
Five years in, Teradata’s move to the cloud is showing up materially in the numbers, now accounting for about a third of annual recurring revenue. And with the move to the cloud, Teradata is seeking to broaden its sights from the Global 1000 to the Global 10,000. Long positioned and perceived as a sophisticated data warehouse designed solely for the most complex use cases, with the scale of the cloud, many “mainstream” enterprises may have Teradata-class analytic problems but not realize it. How does Teradata get its voice heard above the background noise? Click here: Teradata VantageCloud hits inflection point

Three’s Company: Dissecting Oracle’s multicloud partnerships
For a company accustomed to building its own optimized infrastructure, Oracle has embraced multicloud with a vengeance and through a unique path: implanting its Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI) inside the data centers of its cloud partners. Starting five years ago with Microsoft Azure, Oracle followed up early this year with Google Cloud. That lead to the natural question of whether Oracle and AWS could overcome a longstanding fierce rivalry to come to terms. The answer came at Oracle CloudWorld this fall where AWS CEO Matt Garman made a surprise appearance on stage with Larry Ellison. Aside from Nvidia, Oracle is the only provider to literally penetrate AWS, Azure, and Google Cloud data centers. While each of the hyperscaler deals cover Oracle Exadata and Autonomous database, there are differences. How do the relationships compare, and what are their impacts for Oracle customers? Click here: Three’s Company: Dissecting Oracle’s multicloud partnerships

Introducing InterSystems
You probably didn’t know it, but InterSystems pioneered what is now known as the multimodel database. Over the past 40+ years, Cambridge-based InterSystems has hidden in plain sight, largely as an OEM provider of a highly specialized object/relational database for the healthcare industry. Five years ago, the company embarked on a major generational upgrade embracing industry standards, and now the company wants to be known by its brand and transition from an OEM-driven business. the biggest variable is not technology, but rather, the company’s unique business structure and culture: the company’s bylaws ensure that the organization will remain privately held. So, what happens when the founder eventually lets go? Click here: Introducing InterSystems