Pentaho is now partnering with Intel and Amazon, integrating its big data and BI platform with Intel's new Apache Hadoop distribution and Amazon's Redshift database.
Speaking with CRN Wednesday at the big-data-focused Strata event in Santa Clara, Calif., Eddie White, executive vice president of business development at Pentaho, said the new partnerships will help fuel the adoption of Pentaho's data integration and BI tools among organizations it may not otherwise be able to reach.
"There's a tremendous level of very high-end, enterprise exposure, especially from the Intel perspective," White said.
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Pentaho's partnership with Intel is based on an OEM model, through which Intel will bundle Pentaho's big data solutions for data management and integration, along with Pentaho's BI and analytics suite, with its own Apache Hadoop distribution, unveiled earlier this week. The chip maker also announced a strategic alliance with SAP and number of other software vendors related to its new big data platform, but White said the nature of Pentaho's OEM partnership with Intel is unique.
"We're the only OEM in the distribution," White said. "[Intel] has a couple of key partners ... but the OEM piece is us. The distribution is the Apache Hadoop distribution and then we are the embedded analytics and ETL capability."
Pentaho also will integrate its big data platform into Amazon's new cloud-based Redshift data warehouse. Users will be able to leverage Redshift's automation of tasks, including setting up and operating a data warehouse cluster, and then use Pentaho's analytics suite to analyze the data residing in those clusters.
White said Pentaho's expanding ecosystem of partners speaks to the one-stop-shop nature of its platform; Pentaho not only provides the data integration capabilities to move data from traditional relational databases to Hadoop-based ones, but also can cleanse that data. A suite of BI tools -- ranging from reports, to dashboards, to predictive analytics models -- can then derive value from that data.
Pentaho sells predominantly direct in the U.S. but sells almost entirely through the channel in Europe. But White said as the big data market continues to mature, Pentaho plans to build up its North American channel, particularly to target federal agencies.
"The big data market probably needs another year to 18 months to mature to the point where you are going to have your traditional VARs attempt that," White said. "But you will see us expand our government model, because the government is a very channel-driven model. You've got to work the channel dynamics."
PUBLISHED FEB. 28, 2013
