Enterprises will be able to combine workloads while lowering complexity, overhead and costs thanks to the integration of the existing solutions like Power BI and Synapse.
To achieve this goal, Microsoft is integrating its current business intelligence, data analytics, and data warehousing technologies into a single service called Microsoft Fabric.
Microsoft Fabric offers seven essential tools and services
Microsoft Fabric employs a single architecture to give developers a SaaS (software as a service) experience to aid in the extraction of insights coming from raw data and the presentation of those insights to business customers.
It added that new analytics package comes with 7 core modules and toolkit, which include Data engineering tools, data connectors, data processes for data science, and analytics tools.
According to the provider, Data Factory, a module that is now in public preview, offers more than 150 connectors for cloud and on-site data sources, providing drag-and-drop data transformation and the capacity to choreograph data pipelines.
Additionally, Microsoft has incorporated the Synapse Data Engineering module, which is also in public preview and aids in Apache Spark model authoring, according to the company.
Fabric also incorporates Synapse Data Science, a complete solution for data engineers to create complex AI models; and Synapse Data Warehousing, which combines lakehouse as well as data warehousing technologies with the ability to execute SQL upon open data format. Both are available for public preview.
The Synapse Real-Time Analytics module is another one which is still in public preview. It will allow programmers to deal with stream-oriented data and analyze semi-structured data in huge amounts, according to Microsoft.
Additionally, the firm is incorporating a Power BI module into Fabric to assist business users and analysts in extracting insights from data using AI-based tools.
According to Microsoft, Fabric will have a Data Activator module for real-time data detection and monitoring. when it detects specific patterns in data, it would be able to start notifications and actions. It also stated that the module was now in private preview.
The company's portal allows users to access all seven sections, as the company claims.
OpenAI service integrated into Microsoft Fabric
Microsoft is integrating OpenAI service into Fabric and will shortly incorporate Copilot, which is powered by GPT, into the analytics platform.
By removing many of the obstacles between solutions, the integration of the OpenAI service along with Copilot would significantly speed up the work done by data professionals accustomed to Microsoft Azure, according to Bradley Shimmin, principal analyst at Omdia.
According to Mohan, the action can also be interpreted as Microsoft's ongoing efforts to use OpenAI's big language model APIs throughout its whole portfolio.
According to the company, businesses can also use their own data and huge language models from the OpenAI service to build custom conversational language experience. Copilot wasn't trained using tenant data from an enterprise, it was noted.
OneLake support
According to Microsoft, all of Fabric's data and workloads are kept in a SaaS, multiple cloud data center called OneLake, much like how the data from Office 365 applications is kept in OneDrive.
OneLake enables businesses to virtualize data storage in AWS S3, ADLS Gen2 and Storage, the company said, adding that this helps prevent data silos caused by various developers providing and customizing their own separate storage accounts. The launch of OneLake will make it simpler for businesses to develop their own small data lake just in minutes compared to days or even weeks.
A native data format called Delta that is used by default across all workloads is also treated by Fabric as being built on the top of Parquet files.
The use of open-source format might significantly reduce effort, time, and storage requirements.
Additionally, Microsoft announced that it intends to roll out an all-around safety framework for Fabric which is maintained in OneLake to assist businesses in managing data security across various data engines, modules, and tools.
The company claims that the model will make sure that all of the data modules or engines uphold the security model when they carry out various tasks or processes inquiries.
Will Microsoft profit from Fabric Fabric?
Analysts predict that the adoption and acceptance of Microsoft Fabric after its launch might go either way.
However, the chief analyst at Constellation Research, Doug Henschen, cautioned that Fabric's success might not happen right away.
According to Henschen, people need to bear in mind that all revealed are still in preview, and Microsoft's track record for success in industries like data warehousing is erratic. Azure Synapse, recently has not experienced enormous adoption or client acclaim. It's reasonable since companies normally don't switch data platforms frequently.
According to the researchers, Microsoft Fabric could be compared to systems like Google DataPlex, IBM Data Fabric and SAP DataSphere.