Organisations across Australia and APAC are dealing with exponential quantities of data – it’s the culmination of the digital transformation undertaken by thousands of businesses, from the data-savvy digital natives right through to ‘traditional’ enterprises.

In the last few years, the rise of AI & analytics has become one of the defining business opportunities as part of this transformation. This movement has been driven by a sharp growth in organised data sets, rapid advancements in algorithms, and cheap and ubiquitous computing power.

Despite the resources now being within arm’s reach, though, the reality is that many organisations’ efforts are still falling short, with many big data and ML projects failing or being used in siloed business processes, thus only gaining incremental benefits.

As companies continue to figure out how to put their data to work, it’s become increasingly apparent that building a business case for the use of big data and AI is no simple thing to achieve.

That’s where Databricks comes in. A pure-play cloud company specialising in finding value in data and empowering data teams, it was founded by the creators of the Apache Spark project and is now in daily use by leading companies (many of them household names) in the APAC region, and Australia in particular.

Databricks’ unified data analytics platform has broken down the silo between lines of business, data engineering and data science, allowing business functions to collaborate on the types of activities that were, until Databricks emerged, only achievable by specialist data scientists.

That means companies can start using the data they have to help them solve the problems they encounter every day and make better-informed decisions to derive opportunities for profit and competitive advantage in their industry, making – potentially game-changing – product improvements.

Databricks believes that by bringing data science and analytics together into the forefront of business strategy – with participation and input from all levels of the business – and by taking the time to up-skill their teams, companies can find a common ground in moving data science forward.

Databricks’ unified data analytics platform allows business function specialists and data experts to both bring to the table their specific skillsets and work towards their common objectives. Business function specialists from all areas of the enterprise can now bring their local expertise to the same arena as the highly trained statisticians and data miners.

The former bring their need for business-driven insights, while the latter bring knowledge of scripting languages, Python, R and the practical ability to make data transformation seamless and integrated.

The result is one that is a primary business strategy-changer, creating benefits from what have been, until now, “cold archives” of valuable information.

Source: Databricks

Databricks helps companies create multiple views of the same data that can be used for different outcomes, thus producing better interdepartmental co-operation and collaboration. The results for the organisation, therefore, include:

Lower spend on data operations. The use of a central repository of code libraries, information, data sets and outcomes mean that no department or function is replicating work.
Faster time to production. Data models are quicker to prototype, and the collaborative nature of Databricks means that feedback can come from relevant stakeholders throughout the data processing journey.
Combining archives and streams. The advanced interoperability of live data from significant applications in the enterprise combines with advanced data mining. Insights are therefore informed by what’s already happened, and yet remain up-to-the-minute relevant to all stakeholders and business functions.
Lower infrastructure costs. Instead of needing to overprovision resources for any size of data processing pipeline, Databricks’ unified data analytics platform lets companies streamline all development processes as machine learning models are created and productionised, leveraging a fully managed cloud-based platform for your entire data analytics and machine learning lifecycle.

In interviews with customers across industries and regions, a new Forrester Total Economic Impact™ study reveals how data teams — and the entire business — move faster, collaborate better and operate more efficiently when they have a unified, open platform for data.

Customers averaged nearly US$29 million in total economic impact and ROI over three years totalling 417 percent, driven by:

• 5 percent increase in revenues by unlocking new data science opportunities
• US$11 million savings from retiring on-prem infrastructure and legacy licenses
• Faster time to market due to improved data team productivity of up to 25 percent

“Databricks Unified Analytics Platform delivered the time to market as well as the analytics and operational uplift that we needed in order to be able to meet the new demands of the healthcare sector.” ~ Chief Architect, Health Direct Australia

Conclusion
Big data and data science are creating pivot-points for organisations across the world. Predicted data flows continue to need phrases like “enormous” and “exponential”, and businesses in private and public sectors are gradually narrowing the divide between data science disciplines and best business practice.

With Databricks on board as a partner, all the business’s functions (including its strategists and decision-makers) can draw significant value from big data practice. To learn more about Databricks, join the Data + AI Asia Pacific Virtual Conference and get the opportunity to hear the data-driven innovation journeys of Databricks customers, featuring Atlassian and Coles Group.