Qrious launches big data platform Qonnect: 'It's about creating smarter organisations'

Qrious, the big data and analytics software business owned by Spark NZ, has launched the ‘Qonnect’ big data platform.

Qrious CEO David Leach says the cloud-based platform-as-a-service solution is a foundational technology for organisations wanting to go faster on their data-driven journey.

“It is about creating smarter organisations,” he tells CIO New Zealand.

“By using data more effectively, organisations can be more efficient, find new sources of revenue, get insights to make decisions with more confidence or disrupt themselves... As the world around them keeps changing, they can keep changing as well.”

“New Zealand businesses are now recognising all the possible benefits of unleashing the power of big data,” he adds.

Many organisations want to take advantage of this modern technology but they need help from a specialist organisation to augment their current staff base.

The platform allows organisations to store, process, analyse and serve all types of data from one place, supported by data engineers and scientists.

“You can take social data, data relevant to your industry and unstructured data, and take that to the same central data store,” says Leach.

“Once you have laid that foundation, it is what you build on top of it that opens up many possibilities.”

These include having a Customer 360 or a single view of the customer to provide deeper insights and improve your digital engagement with customers, he says.

He says the Qonnect platform reduces data silos, enables self-service and can deliver advanced use cases such as cybersecurity, fraud and compliance, real-time analytics and supply chain optimisation using new technologies such as machine learning and IOT.

“The industry talks about democratising data, making data more accessible. This is the foundation piece that makes it possible,” he states. “Through this, you have a foundation to deliver insight to your frontline staff, to the broader population.”

Leach says the Qonnect platform is currently hosted locally by Revera, and uses Cloudera’s big data ecosystem which includes Apache Spark and Hadoop.

These technologies are already internationally proven, and are the most popular open source software for storing and processing large datasets in batch and real-time, he says.

Akash Jattan, Qrious head of data platforms, says Qrious is the first local Cloudera Managed Service Provider, which means their people have one of the highest Cloudera certification levels in New Zealand.

“This allows us to create simple consumable packages that include Cloudera software delivered in any cloud – well beyond simply reselling Cloudera licences. This, coupled with the depth of experience within the team in analysing and serving data sets, is a significant point of difference for Qrious in the market.”

Jattan explains choosing open source technology was an important consideration in the development of Qonnect. Open source technology enables the rapid development of tools and applications that will allow businesses to innovate faster and at lower cost, he cites.

“We use this platform to power our own customer solutions, such as Voyager and Traffic Management.”

“For us, it ingests and processes approximately three billion events every day. It’s truly remarkable technology and we’re excited to bring the platform and our experience to New Zealand businesses to help accelerate their data journey,” says Jattan.

Leach, meanwhile, says Qonnect will work in time with Ubiquity, the marketing automation provider Qrious purchased early this month.

“That provides possibilities to offer analytics and machine learning baked into the marketing automation platform, which will be exciting for the marketing industry.” 

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