Microsoft Fabric Paves the Way for a New Era of Data Management

At the Build conference last week, Microsoft introduced the world to their latest data management offering with the launch of Microsoft Fabric.

It is a compelling product offering by Microsoft, and we’ll cover the key reasons why we believe it will shape the data industry permanently in this article.

So, what exactly is Microsoft Fabric?

Microsoft Fabric is, at its core, a repackaging of existing technologies that Microsoft has developed into a cohesive data ecosystem. Imagine if Excel, PowerPoint, and Word had been developed independently with different interfaces and were now repacked into a more consistent package called Microsoft Office – well, then you’d be close. Microsoft is essentially taking the following technologies and making them all part of Fabric:

·???????Azure Data Lake

·???????Azure Data Factory

·???????Azure Data Explorer

·???????Azure SQL

·???????Azure Synapse

·???????Azure Machine Learning

·???????Power BI

·???????Purview

The interface is what makes these offerings compelling: you’re never accessing Azure, but able to spin up & access these technologies using what looks like the Power BI interface. And you’re seamlessly switching between each from the same console. Crucially, all your data will now be accessible via “OneLake” – think OneDrive for data.

This essentially means a single product for data engineers, scientists, governance & visualization teams. And data is available in a consistent delta format, meaning consistent formats across the technologies in use.

Why is it called “Microsoft Fabric”?

If you’re not familiar with the concept of a Data Fabric – it’s essentially jargon used in the data industry to refer to the ability to securely access your data wherever it is stored by whichever team needs it and when they need it. And for data vendors, this is usually a significant challenge. Most vendors can deliver on a component of the data fabric, but not the entire data fabric.

It’s clear then that Microsoft believes that its suite of products does, in fact, deliver on the promise of a complete “fabric” to customers. It most likely also signals its intent to own the entire data lifecycle from start to finish – something that must at least be turning the heads of its competitors.

Why is Microsoft Fabric significant for customers?

The image below was taken at the recent Gartner Data & Analytics summit in London. It provides a small glimpse into the vast number of major data vendors offering solutions to customers, all covering a particular area of expertise, e.g. storage, visualization, governance or engineering. Most of the vendors offer compelling products, but these products require integration with other products, and all require significant investment.

The experience is overwhelming even for a data expert, and most likely even more so for a business or IT leader that needs to make a bet on the right technologies to support its corporate strategy. That is a challenge even before you consider the financial outlay required to build a modern technology stack and set up your own technology teams!

This is why Microsoft’s promise of a data fabric is so compelling: what if you only needed one vendor to completely deliver your corporate data strategy? One contract with a major vendor at a predefined pricing tier? Instead of comparing and contrasting numerous vendors in every part of the data fabric? Yes, please!

There is … one more thing….

But there is also something else. This is just the first step for Microsoft in consolidating its product. What is no doubt next, is enabling AI across this single product with its “co-pilot” capabilities that are already making their way into Windows. Imagine, as the next step, if you could simply describe what you needed from your data assets and Microsoft Fabric built it for you? This appears to be the direction as Microsoft already enables you to provide prompts to build your KPI scorecards. It would accelerate the data delivery process beyond measure.

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In summary, we think Microsoft has upstaged the competition by providing a one-stop shop for data management to customers in an easy-to-use fashion. Add in tier-based pricing, and it’s certainly compelling for organizations looking to simplify technology contracts and training. At the same time, the obvious downside is vendor lock-in and compromising on some of the quality of products (e.g. data management & science). But if that doesn’t scare customers … this is going to be a product that shapes the direction of the market going forward.

What do you think? Let us know your thoughts in the comments.