In the last 5 years, the buzzword "big data" has spread like wildfire.  One could argue big data had been around prior, but during this time media outlets such as the Wall Street Journal and C-level executives started to take a keen interest in this topic. No longer a problem specific to the internet giants like Google, Yahoo, and Facebook, companies across all industries were beginning to explore data storage and management strategies beyond the traditional relational database realm.

Why the need for this shift? Data was generated at higher volumes at faster speeds, and was not always easy to work with.  Unstructured data, or data not organized or formatted in a predefined way, came from all directions: call logs, click streams, cheap sensor data, social media posts and many other sources.  A new strategy was necessary to capture and extract business value from this information.

One particular project, Hadoop, was taking off, and SAS was there to get in on the action.  Hadoop is an open-source software framework that runs on low cost commodity hardware and has the ability to scale to accommodate massive amounts of data.

The idea originated in the mid-2000s and gained serious momentum with the formation of the company, Cloudera, in 2008. Cloudera provides a platform for enterprise level customers to utilize the power of Hadoop.  Those enterprise level customers often have a need for analytics which is why it is no surprise that SAS formed an alliance with Cloudera in 2013.

Currently at SAS, there are products such as In-Memory Statistics for Hadoop, Visual Analytics, Visual Statistics, and High-Performance Analytics, to leverage analytics on data in Hadoop. No longer just a buzzword, customers are able to use their big data to gain greater insights and a competitive advantage.

For more on this topic, come see the panel presentation and round table discussion on Hadoop at Analytics 2014 in Las Vegas!

• Panel discussion with SAS and Cloudera on Big Data and Hadoop: Moving beyond the hype to realize your analytics strategy with SAS® - Monday, October 20, 3:00-3:50 pm
• Round Table discussion on Practical Considerations for SAS Analytics in a Hadoop Environment – Tuesday, October 21, 12:30-1:45 pm