Hadoop startup Platfora just announced it closed a $20 million Series B round of funding led by Battery Ventures. Existing backers Andreessen Horowitz and Sutter Hill Venture chipped in as well.

Platfora develops software that takes raw data from Hadoop and processes it using its distributed in-memory engine, which can be deployed across hundreds of server. The company says that this approach eliminates the need for a data warehouse.

The insights that come out on the other side are presented to business users via a UI that displays information and simplifies search and analysis. This interface is implemented in HTML5, which means that the the data is accessible from any device or platform.

“We couldn’t be happier with the way the market has reacted to Platfora – we’ve seen a burning interest in letting non-technical users harness the data in Hadoop for visual insight,” said Ben Werther, CEO and founder, Platfora. “In order to address the interest in Platfora, we need to accelerate our go-to-market strategy and quickly grow our team. We’re so honored to have the investors we do and we are focused on getting Platfora to wide availability in Q1 2013.”

Here is Platfora CEO Ben Werther on SiliconANGLE TV at StrataConf Hadoop World in NYC last month.

Vendors are wrapping familiar BI interfaces around their Hadoop solution to make them more attractive for enterprise clients, and it seems to be working. A growing emphasis on mobility is also a part of this consumerization trend, underscored by Platfora’s latest funding round and the success of a few other emerging names in the industry.

Among these vendors is Hadapt, whose main focus is real-time analytics. The company’s CTO and chief data scientist gave us an exclusive look at how their solution interfaces with Tableau’s data visualization software during Strata Conference +  Hadoop World 2012.