VoltDB Upgrades In-Memory Operational Database

VoltDB has released the latest version of its high-speed operational database that combines real-time in-memory analytics as well as breakthrough speed in a single database system.

Company officials said VoltDB 4.0 enables developers to build high-performance applications capable of analytic insights that enable organisations to take action on vital bits of data to maximise business value.

Data Overload

There is a wealth of data available to organisations that can be used to gain actionable intelligence about customer and market behaviour, Website interactions, service performance and much more. Yet it often goes untapped because organisations don’t have the tools to perform real-time analytics on data moving at breakneck speed.

However, VoltDB is purpose-built to enable applications such as telecommunications billing, gaming, sensor management, smart energy and capital markets to both interact in real-time and provide in-memory analytics so that organisations can capitalise on data the moment it arrives.

“The move toward virtualised infrastructure helps mobile service providers adapt as the manner in which mobile data is consumed and monetized continues to evolve,” Joe Hogan, chief technology officer and founder at Openet, a real-time network transaction management software and VoltDB customer, said in a statement. “VoltDB is the logical choice for a cloud-deployable, transactional database that can flexibly handle high-volume data streams for service providers to monitor and leverage in real time.”

Moreover, “VoltDB 4.0 makes possible high-performance, exceptionally fast business applications designed to realise the promise of big data for many industries,” Bruce Reading president and CEO of VoltDB, said in a statement. “There are some databases that provide in-memory analytical capabilities and others that capably run operational workloads, but VoltDB 4.0 is the only high-speed operational database that delivers real-time data processing and in-memory analytics in a single database system.”

VoltDB 4.0 features a tenfold throughput improvement of analytic queries and is capable of writes and reads on millions of data events per second. New features and key benefits include enhanced in-memory analytics, online operation improvements, expanded integrations – including integration with existing data infrastructure such as message queue systems, improved JDBC driver, monitoring utilities such as New Relic, as well as MySQL migration, including Voltify, a new MySQL migration tool and enhanced training.

In recognition of the market forces shaping the landscape for in-memory databases, Gartner published Who’s Who for In-Memory DBMS on 16 January. In the report, analysts Donald Feinberg and Roxane Edjlali comment on the advantages represented by the combination of real-time transactional and analytical processing in operational databases.

“The main business value offered by an IMDBMS is that it enables new business opportunities that would not have been possible previously,” the report said. “One example is SMS [short Message Service] discount coupons sent to customers based on their preferences when they are in, or close to, a shop. Another example comes from online gambling, where the handicap is computed during an ongoing match. To support such use cases, both the transactional data and the analytics need to be available in real time. The promise of in-memory DBMSes is to enable hybrid transactional and analytical processing platform [HTAP] use cases without having to move the data from one to the other.”

Speedy DB

VoltDB touts its speed of execution, but other in-memory database technologies vie for the attention of enterprise customers; competitors include Oracle’s Times Ten and Coherence technology, SAP’s HANA, competing technology coming out of IBM and Microsoft (SQL Server 2014’s Hekaton) and up and comers such as Hazelcast.

Meanwhile, VoltDB announced that it experienced triple-digit revenue growth in 2013. VoltDB realised a 298 percent increase in revenue and a 368 percent boost in year-over-year bookings in 2013, and surpassed 325 customers under contract.

The company said industry innovators in areas such as telecommunications, e-commerce, power and energy, financial services, advertising and online gaming are turning to VoltDB for high-performance operations with real-time analytics.

In 2013, VoltDB added Airpush, Alcatel-Lucent, Arkalogic, BOLDstreet, CGI/Logica, Eagle Investments, Hewlett-Packard, Mavizon, Neverblue, Novatel, Openet and many others to its rapidly growing customer and partner rosters. These organisations are harnessing the power of VoltDB to develop a new generation of real-time applications that will transform their respective businesses and industries.

“We believe the incredible market demand we’re experiencing is a testament to VoltDB’s inherent and unique ability to support next-generation real-time big data applications,” Reading said in a statement. “These applications must be able to ingest and analyse immense amounts of data in microseconds and take immediate action to capitalise on that intelligence. VoltDB provides the essential combination of in-memory analytics and fully transactional decisioning capabilities to get the job done.”

Originally published on eWeek.