From Siloed Systems to Seamless Processing: How We Migrated Teradata, Hadoop, and Ab Initio ETL to Databricks on Microsoft Azure
Tags: datamigration, cloud, hadoop, teradata
Published: 2024-03-31 18:12:28

In today's data-driven world, organizations grapple with managing data residing in various siloed systems. This often leads to data latency, hindering the ability to gain timely insights and make informed decisions. We recently embarked on a journey to overcome these challenges by migrating our Teradata warehouse, Hadoop ecosystem, and Ab Initio ETL workloads to Databricks on Microsoft Azure. This blog delves into our experience and the key benefits we achieved.

**The Challenge: Siloed Infrastructure and Data Latency**

Our legacy infrastructure consisted of:

Teradata warehouse: While a powerful solution, its on-premises nature limited scalability and incurred high maintenance costs.

Hadoop ecosystem: Provided flexibility but managing a standalone cluster proved resource-intensive.

Ab Initio ETL: Efficient for data extraction and transformation, but integration with other systems required additional effort.

**This siloed approach resulted in:**

Data latency: Delays in data processing due to the movement of data between disparate systems.

Limited scalability: Difficulty in scaling resources to accommodate growing data volumes.

High operational costs: Managing multiple systems was expensive and time-consuming.

The Solution: Databricks Migration on Microsoft Azure
We opted for a strategic migration to Databricks on Microsoft Azure. 

**This cloud-based platform offered several advantages:
**
Unified data platform: Databricks consolidated our data warehouse, processing capabilities, and ETL processes into a single, unified environment.

Elastic scalability: Azure's cloud infrastructure allowed us to easily scale resources up or down based on our data processing needs.

Reduced costs: By eliminating the need to manage on-premises hardware and software licenses, we achieved significant cost savings.

Databricks Migration: A Collaborative Effort

**The migration process involved:**

Assessment and planning: A thorough analysis of our existing infrastructure and data pipelines was conducted to determine the optimal migration strategy.

Data migration: We leveraged etl data migration tools to ensure the seamless transfer of data from our legacy systems to Databricks.

Code refactoring: Our Ab Initio ETL processes were adapted to run efficiently within the Databricks environment.

Microsoft Azure played a crucial role by providing:

Scalable infrastructure: Azure offered the necessary resources to support our growing data volumes and processing demands.

[Cloud cost management tools](https://www.datametica.com/eliminated-data-latency-and-optimized-cost-by-migrating-teradata-hadoop-and-abinitio-etl-to-databricks-on-microsoft/): We utilized Azure's built-in tools to optimize our cloud spending and identify potential cost savings.

The Outcome: Eliminated Latency, Optimized Costs

Our migration to Databricks on Azure has yielded significant benefits:

Real-time data processing: Databricks' in-memory processing capabilities significantly reduced data latency, enabling us to gain near real-time insights from our data.

Improved scalability: The cloud-based nature of Databricks allows us to effortlessly scale our resources to meet our evolving business needs.
Reduced operational costs: By eliminating the need for on-premises infrastructure management, we achieved substantial cost savings.

### Conclusion

Migrating from siloed systems to Databricks on Microsoft Azure proved to be a transformative experience. We successfully eliminated data latency, optimized our cloud costs, and gained a unified platform for all our data processing needs. This transition has empowered us to make data-driven decisions faster and gain a competitive edge in the marketplace.