Data Virtualization in the Cloud
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The data landscape is constantly changing. Every day, we deal with tons of data in different formats from different applications, and it’s stored both on-premises and in the cloud. In this kind of a landscape, how can we gain insights from data in a faster, more cost-effective manner?

This is where data virtualization comes into play. It provides real-time, integrated views across multiple source systems without having to replicate the source data into a new, consolidated repository. Gartner, in its 2018 Market Guide for Data Virtualization, says that “Through 2022, 60% of all organizations will implement data virtualization as one key delivery style in their data integration architecture.”

Also, data’s center of gravity is slowly but surely shifting from on-premises systems to the cloud. How can organizations move their applications and workloads to the cloud, without disrupting business users?

Once again, data virtualization provides the answer. Because data virtualization provides a unified data-access layer across an organization’s myriad disparate data sources, regardless of where they are located, it provides seamless access to data, even if the data is in the process of being migrated. In this way, it alleviates the pain of migration, enabling organizations to migrate at their own pace, with zero impact on day-to-day operations.

Having migrated to the cloud, however, most organizations do not completely do away with their on-premises infrastructure. Instead, they move forward with hybrid infrastructures, with some data on-premises and some in the cloud. By providing real-time data across both kinds of sources, simultaneously, data virtualization makes such hybrid infrastructures possible.

The Flexibility of the Denodo Platform

The Denodo Platform is a best-in-class data virtualization offering that can be deployed either on-premises or in the cloud. In the cloud, it can be deployed on Amazon Web Services (AWS) Cloud, Microsoft Azure Cloud, or Google Cloud Platform (GCP). With this flexibility, the Denodo Platform supports multi-location architecture across on-premises and cloud systems, and across the clouds offered by multiple vendors, even if an organization’s workloads are spread across them.

The Denodo Platform therefore supports a wide range of use cases, including:

  • Data-as-a-Service (DaaS): The Denodo Platform enables organizations to expose data through APIs, providing a strong foundation for DaaS implementations.
  • Data Warehouse Modernization: Traditional on-premises data warehouses have limited support for today’s rich variety of data types. With the Denodo Platform, organizations can modernize their data warehouses without requiring downtime or otherwise disrupting user activity. 
  • Logical Data Warehouse Architecture: Going one step further than a data warehouse modernization, many organizations are leveraging the Denodo Platform to implement logical data warehouses, which connect to disparate data types, logically, rather than physically collecting them in a single repository. This is important, because organizations are always trying to gain a single version of the truth from their data, and in a more simplified manner.
  • Advanced Analytics and Data Science: Data analysts and data scientists often spend more time collecting the right data than analyzing it. The Denodo Platform offers an advanced data catalog that simplifies data discovery for these users by listing all of the available data in a single, organized, and curated list. To make life even easier for these users, the Denodo Platform’s data catalog even provides direct access to the needed data.

Deployment Models

The Denodo Platform can be deployed in the cloud in one of two ways:

  1. Bring your own license (BYOL): Organizations can purchase one or more Denodo Platform licenses directly from Denodo and deploy the Denodo Platform within the organization’s own infrastructure, as an Infrastructure-as-a-Service (IaaS) deployment model.
  2. Deploy on your chosen cloud marketplace: Organizations can purchase the Denodo Platform directly on their chosen marketplace (AWS, Azure, or GCP), where it is deployed by the cloud provider. This deployment option offers a wide range of prices and configurations. Organizations can start small and grow as needed.

The Case of GetSmarter

One Denodo customer, GetSmarter, is an educational institution based in Cape Town, South Africa and London, England. GetSmarter was struggling to integrate data between its cloud and on-premises systems, and on top of that, the company was trying to run advanced analytics. The Denodo Platform accelerated the company’s journey to transform its data infrastructure into a well-integrated machine that supports advanced analytics.

Take a Test Drive

We have many more customer examples on our website, but the best way to experience the benefits of the Denodo Platform is to try it out for yourself with one of several use-case-themed test drives. Whether you’re doing BI analytics or data science, or implementing a DaaS project, these test drives provide hands-on experience with the Denodo Platform in less than 2 hours, free of cost. If you are really serious about kicking the tires, we also offer a 30-day free trial of the Denodo Platform on the cloud marketplace of your choice.

Mitesh Shah
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