Close
  • Latest News
  • Artificial Intelligence
  • Video
  • Big Data and Analytics
  • Cloud
  • Networking
  • Cybersecurity
  • Applications
  • IT Management
  • Storage
  • Sponsored
  • Mobile
  • Small Business
  • Development
  • Database
  • Servers
  • Android
  • Apple
  • Innovation
  • Blogs
  • PC Hardware
  • Reviews
  • Search Engines
  • Virtualization
Read Down
Sign in
Close
Welcome!Log into your account
Forgot your password?
Read Down
Password recovery
Recover your password
Close
Search
Logo
Subscribe
Logo
  • Latest News
  • Artificial Intelligence
  • Video
  • Big Data and Analytics
  • Cloud
  • Networking
  • Cybersecurity
  • Applications
  • IT Management
  • Storage
  • Sponsored
  • Mobile
  • Small Business
  • Development
  • Database
  • Servers
  • Android
  • Apple
  • Innovation
  • Blogs
  • PC Hardware
  • Reviews
  • Search Engines
  • Virtualization
More
    Subscribe
    Home Cloud
    • Cloud
    • Database
    • Networking
    • Storage

    EMC to Acquire Data Warehouse Analytics Provider Greenplum

    Written by

    Chris Preimesberger
    Published July 6, 2010
    Share
    Facebook
    Twitter
    Linkedin

      eWEEK content and product recommendations are editorially independent. We may make money when you click on links to our partners. Learn More.

      Storage giant EMC revealed July 6 that it is acquiring privately held Greenplum, which provides next-generation database warehousing software and self-service, cloud-based analytics for enterprises.
      Terms of the all-cash transaction were not disclosed, but EMC did say it expects the deal to close in September.
      Greenplum, the main market of which is enterprises with large amounts of data to store in cloud deployments, will form the foundation of a new data computing product division within EMC’s Information Infrastructure business, Chuck Hollis, an EMC vice president and the global marketing CTO, told eWEEK.
      Greenplum’s MPP (massively parallel processing) SG Streaming (Scatter/Gather Streaming) “secret sauce” is designed to eliminate the bottlenecks associated with other approaches to data loading. The company follows a parallel-everywhere approach to loading, in which data flows from one or more source systems to every node of the database.
      Greenplum’s software is capable of delivering 10 to 100 times the performance of traditional database software, EMC said. Data-driven businesses that include NASDAQ OMX, NYSE Euronext, Skype, Equifax, T-Mobile and Fox Interactive Media currently use Greenplum for its cloud-based high-performance data analytics service.
      Greenplum is different from traditional bulk loading technologies used by most mainstream database and MPP appliance vendors that push data from a single source, often over a single or small number of parallel channels. The aforementioned situation can-and often does-result in bottlenecks and lengthier load times.
      “There’s always a bottleneck in those data warehouses, whether it’s in the database, the servers, or the storage,” analyst Brian Babineau of Enterprise Strategy Group told eWEEK. “Everybody tries to solve those bottlenecks in a different way. And it’s easy to blame the storage, because disk drives tend to be the slowest part of the bottleneck.
      “The reality is that EMC does not want to give up that business [storage and database optimization software] to the likes of Oracle or other folks because it’s just a storage player. Now they have Greenplum, ideally suited for x86 environments, and which distributes workloads very well among shared storage resources.”
      Greenplum, which works only on x86 open systems and utilizes the open source PostgreSQL database, fits right into EMC’s overall “big data” plans, Babineau said.
      “The second angle here is that EMC has deployments on the back ends of a lot of data warehousing systems,” Babineau said.
      Greenplum has challenged established vendors such as Oracle, Teradata and Netezza, and has been successful in only seven years of existence.
      “The data warehousing world is about to change,” said Pat Gelsinger, president and chief operating officer of EMC Information Infrastructure Products. “Greenplum’s massively parallel, scale-out architecture, along with its self-service consumption model, has enabled it to separate itself from the incumbent players and emerge as the leader in this industry shift toward ‘big data’ analytics.”
      In acquiring Greenplum, EMC saw an opportunity for the storage market to evolve, EMC’s Hollis told eWEEK.
      “Put it all together: big data, billions of records, the new mandate to make real-time analytics a weapon, the advent of fully virtualized environments, self-serve analytics and people who are good knowledge workers,” Hollis said. “This is not about doing what was done previously, better. This is about entirely new use cases for big data. We’re betting on the future rather than trying to monetize the past.”
      ‘Good synergy’ developed over time
      The two companies kept running into each other in various deployments during the last two years or so, and eventually a good synergy developed, Greenplum co-founder and President Scott Yara told eWEEK.
      “The alignment was so close in a number of ways: in terms of how we viewed the importance of data, the idea of moving processing closer to where the data lives, and the role that virtualization and private cloud computing is going to play in data analytics,” Yara said. “The idea came that maybe we should join forces. We decided that it was either going to happen very quickly, or that we would just keep going, because it was going very well.”
      Greenplum employs about 140 people in the San Francisco Bay Area.
      “We believe so much in this idea [of moving processing and data closer together for performance efficiency], that Greenplum will be the nucleus of a whole new EMC products group,” Hollis said. “Much like the way Data Domain [2009] and RSA [2006] came in, when we built entire product divisions around them, we’re going to ask the Greenplum leadership team to do the exact same thing for us.”
      Babineau said 2010 could be a breakout year in data warehousing.
      “This is a very interesting space,” Babineau said. “The two biggest companies in it, Teradata and Netezza, are totaling about $2 billion in trailing 12-month revenue … Teradata about $1.7 billion and Netezza about $203 million.
      “There is clearly a lot of money being spent in this area, and EMC wants its fair share of this stuff.”
      Editor’s Note: eWEEK Senior Writer Brian Prince contributed to this report.

      Chris Preimesberger
      Chris Preimesberger
      https://www.eweek.com/author/cpreimesberger/
      Chris J. Preimesberger is Editor Emeritus of eWEEK. In his 16 years and more than 5,000 articles at eWEEK, he distinguished himself in reporting and analysis of the business use of new-gen IT in a variety of sectors, including cloud computing, data center systems, storage, edge systems, security and others. In February 2017 and September 2018, Chris was named among the 250 most influential business journalists in the world (https://richtopia.com/inspirational-people/top-250-business-journalists/) by Richtopia, a UK research firm that used analytics to compile the ranking. He has won several national and regional awards for his work, including a 2011 Folio Award for a profile (https://www.eweek.com/cloud/marc-benioff-trend-seer-and-business-socialist/) of Salesforce founder/CEO Marc Benioff--the only time he has entered the competition. Previously, Chris was a founding editor of both IT Manager's Journal and DevX.com and was managing editor of Software Development magazine. He has been a stringer for the Associated Press since 1983 and resides in Silicon Valley.
      Linkedin Twitter

      Get the Free Newsletter!

      Subscribe to Daily Tech Insider for top news, trends & analysis

      Get the Free Newsletter!

      Subscribe to Daily Tech Insider for top news, trends & analysis

      MOST POPULAR ARTICLES

      Artificial Intelligence

      9 Best AI 3D Generators You Need...

      Sam Rinko - June 25, 2024 0
      AI 3D Generators are powerful tools for many different industries. Discover the best AI 3D Generators, and learn which is best for your specific use case.
      Read more
      Cloud

      RingCentral Expands Its Collaboration Platform

      Zeus Kerravala - November 22, 2023 0
      RingCentral adds AI-enabled contact center and hybrid event products to its suite of collaboration services.
      Read more
      Artificial Intelligence

      8 Best AI Data Analytics Software &...

      Aminu Abdullahi - January 18, 2024 0
      Learn the top AI data analytics software to use. Compare AI data analytics solutions & features to make the best choice for your business.
      Read more
      Latest News

      Zeus Kerravala on Networking: Multicloud, 5G, and...

      James Maguire - December 16, 2022 0
      I spoke with Zeus Kerravala, industry analyst at ZK Research, about the rapid changes in enterprise networking, as tech advances and digital transformation prompt...
      Read more
      Video

      Datadog President Amit Agarwal on Trends in...

      James Maguire - November 11, 2022 0
      I spoke with Amit Agarwal, President of Datadog, about infrastructure observability, from current trends to key challenges to the future of this rapidly growing...
      Read more
      Logo

      eWeek has the latest technology news and analysis, buying guides, and product reviews for IT professionals and technology buyers. The site’s focus is on innovative solutions and covering in-depth technical content. eWeek stays on the cutting edge of technology news and IT trends through interviews and expert analysis. Gain insight from top innovators and thought leaders in the fields of IT, business, enterprise software, startups, and more.

      Facebook
      Linkedin
      RSS
      Twitter
      Youtube

      Advertisers

      Advertise with TechnologyAdvice on eWeek and our other IT-focused platforms.

      Advertise with Us

      Menu

      • About eWeek
      • Subscribe to our Newsletter
      • Latest News

      Our Brands

      • Privacy Policy
      • Terms
      • About
      • Contact
      • Advertise
      • Sitemap
      • California – Do Not Sell My Information

      Property of TechnologyAdvice.
      © 2024 TechnologyAdvice. All Rights Reserved

      Advertiser Disclosure: Some of the products that appear on this site are from companies from which TechnologyAdvice receives compensation. This compensation may impact how and where products appear on this site including, for example, the order in which they appear. TechnologyAdvice does not include all companies or all types of products available in the marketplace.

      ×