The Coolest Database System Companies Of The 2022 Big Data 100
Part 2 of CRN’s Big Data 100 includes a look at the vendors solution providers should know in the big data database system space.
Left On Base
The total amount of data created and replicated worldwide reached 64.2 zettabytes in 2020, according to market researcher IDC, and is continuing to grow at a CAGR of 23 percent. That means the total “global datasphere” will reach 181 zettabytes in 2025.
Statistics like those make database administrators, who have to manage, organize and process all that data, shudder. To make productive use of ever-growing volumes of data, businesses and organizations need the right database technology to manage massive volumes of data and make it available for transactional and analytical applications.
As part of the CRN 2022 Big Data 100, we’ve put together the following list of database system companies—from well-established vendors to those in startup mode—that solution providers should be familiar with. These include providers of database technology designed for running enterprise applications and processing huge numbers of transactions. They also include developers of database software focused on the data analysis tasks companies use to get insight into their business and gain competitive advantages.
This week CRN is running the Big Data 100 list in a series of slide shows, organized by technology category, spotlighting vendors of business analytics software, database platforms, data warehouse systems, data management and integration software, data science and machine learning tools, and big data systems and cloud platforms.
Some vendors market big data products that span multiple technology categories. They appear in the slideshow for the technology segment in which they are most prominent.
Cockroach Labs
Top Executive: CEO Spencer Kimball
Cockroach Labs develops CockroachDB, a cloud-native, distributed SQL database that provides elasticity, a failure-resistant architecture and multi-cloud flexibility and can handle workloads with massive volumes of transactional data. The database is “designed for speed, scale and survival”—hence the Cockroach name.
The company also offers CockroachCloud, a fully managed cloud instance of CockroachDB.
In December New York-based Cockroach Labs raised $278 million in Series F funding, boosting the company’s valuation to $5 billion.
Couchbase
Top Executive: President, CEO Matt Cain
Couchbase Server is a cloud-native, distributed, database for running enterprise applications. The database combines the characteristics of relational database technology, such as SQL and ACID transactions, with the JSON flexibility and scale that defines NoSQL database systems.
In October 2021 the company launched Couchbase Capella, a hosted, fully managed and automated Database as a Service running on Amazon Web Services for building and deploying enterprise applications.
DataStax
Top Executive: CEO Chet Kapoor
DataStax markets DataStax Enterprise, a distributed NoSQL database built on the Apache Cassandra open-source database that’s designed to handle huge volumes of data.
The Santa Clara, Calif.-based company also offers Astra DB, a multi-cloud Database as a Service also built on Cassandra, and Astra Streaming, a multi-cloud event streaming service based on Apache Pulsar.
EDB
Top Executive: President and CEO Ed Boyajian
EDB (previously EnterpriseDB) markets EDB Postgres Advanced Server, an enterprise-scale database based on the open-source PostgreSQL database, along with software, services and support for PostgreSQL users.
EDB’s software is compatible with Oracle’s flagship database product and EDB markets its database as a lower-cost alternative.
In November EDB, based in Bedford, Mass., launched BigAnimal, a fully managed PostgreSQL database in the cloud, and Cloud Native PostgreSQL, an operator for managing PostgreSQL workloads on Kubernetes clusters.
Exasol
Top Executive: CEO Aaron Auld
Exasol offers an in-memory, column-oriented relational database system that’s specifically designed for high-performance data analysis tasks.
The Exasol database can be deployed on-premises, in the cloud or in hybrid-cloud environments, uses a shared-nothing MPP (massively parallel processing) architecture, and supports the building and running of data science models directly in the database.
Based in Nuremberg, Germany, Exasol has a U.S. office in Atlanta.
Fluree
Top Executive: Co-Founder, CEO Brian Platz
Fluree develops its Web3 Data Platform, based on semantic graph database and blockchain technology, which provides data integrity and traceability and facilitates secure data sharing.
Fluree, based in Winston-Salem, N.C., has operated the Fluree Partner Network program for ISVs, systems integrators, VARs and cloud infrastructure partners since April 2020.
Imply
Top Executive: CEO Fangjin Yang
Imply recently launched Imply Polaris, a real-time database for developing analytical applications. Polaris is delivered as a fully managed Database as a Service, along with a multistage query engine, to help programmers build high-performance analytical applications that work with both real-time and historical data.
Polaris is based on the Apache Druid open-source analytical database and Imply was founded by Druid’s original developers. The database is part of Imply’s Project Shapeshift to expand Druid’s capabilities and adoption.
Imply, based in Burlingame, Calif., raised $70 million in Series C funding in June 2021.
InfluxData
Top Executive: CEO Evan Kaplan
InfluxData develops InfluxDB, a time series database that provides rapid, high-availability storage and retrieval capabilities to handle massive volumes of time-stamped data generated by sensors, IoT devices, applications and infrastructure monitoring systems. The company recently reported accelerated customer adoption for IoT and industrial IoT applications.
InfluxDB Cloud, a Database-as-a-Service edition of the software, is available on the Amazon Web Services, Microsoft Azure and Google Cloud platforms.
InfluxData is based in San Francisco.
Kinetica
Top Executive: CEO Nima Negahban
Kinetica develops what it calls an “analytic database for time and space.” The database is designed to work with GPUs and other vector processors to ingest, analyze and visualize massive datasets with trillions of rows of data and process workloads involving data aggregations, graphs and time series.
In September Kinetica, based in Arlington, Va., unveiled native integration for its database with Apache Kafka, the open-source event streaming system, and API integration with Confluent’s streaming data platform.
MariaDB
Top Executive: CEO Michael Howard
MariaDB offers the popular community-developed, commercially supported MariaDB relational database that’s used for both transactional computing and analytical tasks.
In 2021 the company launched MariaDB Xpand, a distributed SQL database for running web, mobile and IoT applications at a scale that the company says standard relational databases cannot achieve. The company also markets MariaDB SkySQL, a fully managed cloud Database as a Service that supports transactional and analytical applications.
MariaDB, based in Redwood City, Calif., was founded in 2009 by the original developers of the popular MySQL database (which is now owned by Oracle) and MariaDB was originally built on the MySQL code base. On Feb. 1 the company announced plans to become a public company on the New York Stock Exchange sometime in the second half of 2022.
MongoDB
Top Executive: President, CEO Dev Ittycheria
MongoDB is a next-generation database developer that competes against established database vendors with its MongoDB document-oriented NoSQL database and its MongoDB Atlas fully managed Database as a Service.
In March MongoDB and Amazon Web Services unveiled a comprehensive strategic alliance through which the two companies are collaborating across a broad range of go-to-market and customer support activities, including providing cloud migration services for customers and partners and launching joint development initiatives around AWS Graviton processors and AWS Outposts.
Earlier this month MongoDB, based in New York, debuted a pay-as-you-go MongoDB Atlas service that can be launched from the Google Console.
Neo4j
Top Executive: Co-Founder, CEO Emil Eifrem
Neo4j develops the Neo4j graph database, an ACID-compliant transactional database with native graph processing and storage capabilities for applications that require real-time transaction processing, advanced AI and machine learning, and intuitive data visualization.
Earlier this month the company unveiled AuraDS, a fully managed cloud service based on the company’s Neo4j Graph Data Science graph analytics workspace for data scientists.
In June 2021 Neo4j, based in San Mateo, Calif., raised $325 million in a Series F financing round.
PlanetScale
Top Executive: CEO Sam Lambert
PlanetScale has developed a highly scalable, serverless, SQL database for deploying and managing large clusters of database instances. The database, which targets developers, uses “sharding,” a technique for scaling a database by spreading data tables across multiple database instances.
The company also offers PlanetScaleDB Cloud, a fully managed, multi-cloud, multi-region Database as a Service.
In November 2021 PlanetScale, based in Mountain View, Calif., raised $50 million in Series C funding.
Redis
Top Executive: Co-Founder and CEO Ofer Bengal
Redis develops a high-performance, real-time NoSQL database that has become one of the more popular next-generation databases that compete with mainstream database software such as the Oracle Database and Microsoft SQL Server.
In addition to providing the Redis open-source database software, Redis Labs sells Redis Enterprise, a commercial edition of the database. The company also offers Redis Enterprise Cloud, a fully managed Database as a Service that runs on AWS, Microsoft Azure and Google Cloud platforms.
Previously known as “Redis Labs,” the Mountain View, Calif.-based company changed its name to simply “Redis” in August 2021. In April 2021 the company announced a $110 million late-stage round of funding.
ScyllaDB
Top Executive: Co-Founder, CEO Dor Laor
ScyllaDB develops the open-source database of the same name. ScyllaDB is a distributed, NoSQL, wide-column data store that is positioned against the Apache Cassandra and AWS DynamoDB databases. ScyllaDB’s competitive advantages are speed, low-latency and high throughput with its ability to rapidly process huge volumes of data.
ScyllaDB offers an open-source edition of its database, a commercial enterprise edition with premium features and extended support, and a cloud Database-as-a-Service edition.
In January ScyllaDB, based in Palo Alto, Calif., said that net-new annual recurring revenue grew 106 percent in 2021 with the majority of that growth coming from ScyllaDB Cloud.
SingleStore
Top Executive: CEO Raj Verma
SingleStore touts its distributed, SQL relational database as the ideal database for operational analytics and AI/machine learning applications that require high performance in data ingest, transaction processing and query processing.
Like many other next-generation database developers, SingleStore pitches itself as a replacement for mainstream databases from Oracle and other vendors.
In September SingleStore, based in San Francisco, said that it had raised $80 million in Series F funding with Hewlett Packard Enterprise and IBM among the investors.
SQream Technologies
Top Executive: Co-Founder, CEO Ami Gal
SQream’s Data Acceleration Platform is designed to perform data analysis tasks against massive volumes of data. The SQream relational database at the system’s core utilizes high-performance GPU processors to handle ingestion of terabytes— even petabytes—of data and rapidly process complex SQL queries.
In December SQream struck a deal to acquire Panoply, a developer of a no-code cloud data platform that includes ETL and data warehouse management services, in a move that will expand SQream’s cloud offerings.
SQream, is based in Tel Aviv, Israel, and New York.
TigerGraph
Top Executive: CEO Yu Xu
TigerGraph develops its distributed, scalable TigerGraph DB graph database that the company says is based on a “native parallel graph” design that focuses on both storage and computation. That design supports real-time graph updates and built-in parallel computation, enabling “real-time analytics on web-scale data,” according to the company.
In addition to the TigerGraph DB Enterprise database, TigerGraph’s product offerings include the TigerGraph Cloud Database as a Service and GraphStudio graphical user interface.
In February TigerGraph, based in Redwood City, Calif., launched the “Graph for All Million Dollar Challenge,” promising financial rewards for tech professionals, data scientists, developers, researchers and university students who develop the most innovative ways to harness graph database technology.
Timescale
Top Executive: Co-Founder, CEO Ajay Kulkarni
Timescale offers TimescaleDB, a time-series relational database based on the open-source PostgreSQL database. TimescaleDB is specifically developed for ingesting, managing and analyzing time-series or time-stamped data—such as data from financial trading systems and Internet of Things sensors.
In October 2021 the company launched Timescale Cloud, a hosted edition of the company’s time series database.
Timescale, based in New York, raised $110 million in a Series C financing round in February, boosting the New York-based company’s valuation to more than $1 billion.
Yugabyte
Top Executive: Bill Cook, CEO
Yugabyte has been getting a lot of attention with YugabyteDB, a next-generation, distributed relational database designed to handle huge amounts of data spanning multiple geographic regions and availability zones. The database supports global, business-critical applications—such as in cybersecurity and financial services—that require low query latency and extreme resilience against failures.
In September the company launched Yugabyte Cloud, a fully managed Database as a Service for building cloud-based applications and moving legacy applications to cloud platforms.
In October Yugabyte raised $188 million in a Series C round of funding that put the Sunnyvale, Calif.-based company’s valuation at more than $1.3 billion.