Cloudera has been at the forefront of the open source development of Hadoop. In an interview conducted by John Furrier and Dave Vellante, Cloudera’s VP of Marketing, Alan Saldich, lauded his company’s technical foundation while discussing their current shift toward making the Hadoop platform more palatable for the Enterprise.

To that aim, specifically, Cloudera recently launched what they are calling the ‘Enterprise Data Hub.’ Saldich, with Cloudera for two years, commented that even just last year the company focus was on Hadoop distribution. The problem with maintaining a purely technical product-to-market approach is that most Enterprise clients don’t care about the intricacies of the product and actually find the complexity of Hadoop overwhelming. “We need to simplify our own product packaging and positioning.”

Anyone previously familiar with Cloudera will see their new packaging and pricing as a completely new and more easily digestible approach. As Saldich notes, they have identified that they service three basic types of customers and they have launched the Enterprise Data Hub in three distinct tiers of product and service to meet the needs of each type of customer.

“There is the customer who is completely self-supporting.” Cloudera’s offering for this client who enjoys working with Hadoop and getting into the nuts and bolts is the Supportive Hadoop Cluster. This package is based just around the delivery of a supportive Hadoop cluster. Still other customers know they want to deploy Hadoop for storage but will require service to help them see it to a level of maturity. Called Hadoop Enterprise Flex Edition, this option allows the customer to select one component add-on per cluster deployed.

The top of the line offering, perhaps most attractive to the larger Enterprise, provides the client with Hadoop clusters, each of the available component add-ons and plenty of service to help them develop solutions to solve their specific business problems. Cloudera calls this their Cloudera Enterprise Data Hub Edition and it is popular not only for its cost but also because it allows the purchasing company to not have to delve into the minutiae of Hadoop.

“We’ve kind of set the pricing where it is a lot cheaper than our previous model,” Saldich stated. “Before, it was ala carte. We found it to be confusing for the customer. The power of Hadoop isn’t just storing data, it’s utilizing the components to use several frameworks together on the same data.”

Saldich employed a familiar analogy to explain the Cloudera Enterprise Data Hub Edition. “It’s like the Lexus when it first came out. There are no options. You get everything.” Companies that might not be ready for that level might opt for either of the other two options available. Cloudera recognizes there are organizations that may just be learning about Hadoop. “They may not be mature enough, but they’ll get there.”

Squashing skepticism

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A lot of uncertainty and skepticism among the Enterprise stems from the fact they are currently running an Enterprise Data Warehouse. Cloudera stresses Hadoop adoption does not require abandoning EDW. Rather, when the EDW is ready for partial upgrade, it might be a better option to deploy a Hadoop cluster. Not only will bringing in Hadoop yield an immediate ROI in terms of expense, but it will allow the Enterprise to operate their EDW more efficiently for other necessary tasks.

“Take all your data and put it in one place,” Saldich states. “Hadoop frees you from constraints of EDW.” Another excellent analogy posited by Saldich was comparing the Hadoop cluster to a smartphone while the EDW would be a DSLR camera. “The DSLR is a way better camera. But chances are you use the camera on your smartphone more often because it is integrated with all the apps on your phone.” The EDW is a richer, more robust platform. But the Enterprise Data Hub is more flexible, cheaper and can be used forever, according to Saldich.

When an enterprise contacts Cloudera, the push is not immediately into Hadoop. “We talk about helping them solve their business problems,” Saldich said. “We listen to the customer and find a use case to answer their needs.” Once they determine need, Cloudera presents added value by progressing into the superior analytics and other benefits presented by an Hadoop deployment.

SiliconANGLE has long been watching the progress of Cloudera and Furrier noted it is clear they are in the midst of an evolution from the company they once were. “As you continue to evolve, what is the new magic for Cloudera,” he inquired of Saldich.

“We are very focused,” Saldich answered. “Tom Riley is our CEO. He came onboard last summer and he has helped the company focus. Hadoop is still central to our company. We aren’t leaving that behind.” He continued, “In the last year, we have beefed up our tech support and services. We are building the business culture on top of a strong technical foundation.”

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