Data and analytics platform provider Databricks has launched availability on Google Cloud, adding to its Amazon Web Services (AWS) and Microsoft Azure offerings.

The jointly developed service provides ‘a simple, open lakehouse platform for data engineering, data science, analytics, and machine learning’, in the words of Hiral Jasani, Databricks partner marketing manager, in a blog post.

This means Databricks is tightly integrated with Google Cloud compute, storage, analytics, and management products. Examples include containers – Databricks on Google Cloud being ‘the first fully container-based Databricks runtime on any cloud’ – and optimised connections to Google BigQuery.

The move means Databricks is now integrated with the three largest hyperscale clouds – although the devil is in the detail. Whereas the partnership with Google Cloud – and AWS – is more typical, Databricks’ Azure integration is a first-party Microsoft service; in other words, sold and supported directly by Microsoft. Azure Databricks is a platform ‘optimised for the Azure cloud services platform’, as the documentation puts it.

Customer demand for the Google partnership is noticeable, however. Jasani noted a leading global fast food brand – and Google Cloud customer – who is looking to build and deploy solutions around churn reduction and behavioural segmentation for ‘about a dozen global markets’ by the end of this year. “By architecting a global data platform with Databricks, they will provide each regional business with a choice for their public cloud platform,” wrote Jasani.

“The launch of Databricks on Google Cloud is a win-win for customers,” Jasani added. “The tight integration of Databricks with Google Cloud’s analytics and AI products delivers a broad range of capabilities – with more to come.”

Even in the attractive big data space, Databricks stands out as a funding darling. Earlier this month, the company closed a $1 billion series G investment, pegging a $28bn valuation. The round was led by Franklin Templeton, a new investor, while AWS also participated. In October 2019, the company’s valuation was at $6bn after a $400m series F round.

Databricks was ranked #5 in the most recent Forbes Cloud 100, featuring the top 100 privately held cloud computing companies.

You can read the full Google Cloud announcement here.

Photo by Sharon McCutcheon from Pexels

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