Databricks Unveils AI-Driven BI Tool to Democratise Data Analytics

SAN FRANCISCO, June 12, 2024 — Databricks, a prominent player in the Data and AI industry, has introduced its latest offering, Databricks AI/BI. This new business intelligence product is designed to make analytics more accessible across all levels of an organisation.

The newly launched Databricks AI/BI combines two core components: AI/BI Dashboards and AI/BI Genie. Dashboards provide an AI-powered, low-code interface for creating interactive visualisations, while Genie offers a conversational interface that responds to natural language queries. Both functionalities are integrated with a compound AI system that evolves with usage across an organisation’s data settings, including ETL pipelines, data lineage, and queries.

Towards Self-Service BI

Historically, business intelligence tools have enabled access to data through pre-defined reports and dashboards, capable of answering specific questions that users might have. However, new data or changing business conditions often create a need for additional insights, which typically require intervention from data specialists. Recent advancements in generative AI have aimed to bridge this gap by layering large language models (LLMs) atop existing BI platforms. However, these add-on solutions often struggle with the complexities of real-world data.

According to Databricks Co-founder and CEO Ali Ghodsi, a shift in BI software design is necessary. “A truly intelligent BI solution needs to understand the unique semantics and nuances of a business to effectively answer questions for business users,” Ghodsi said, highlighting the limitations of traditional BI tools. The new AI/BI system seeks to address these challenges by placing AI at the centre of its design.

Compound AI System

The core of Databricks AI/BI is a compound AI system powered by an ensemble of specialised AI agents. These agents work on specific tasks, such as planning, SQL generation, visualisation, and result certification. Additionally, the system includes components like a response ranking subsystem and a vector index to enhance its reasoning capabilities. The AI/BI system continuously learns and improves from user feedback. For example, if users define churned customers, the system will adapt that knowledge for similar queries in the future, such as regional variations in churn rates.

Dual Interfaces

The system powers two main interfaces:
– AI/BI Dashboards: A low-code solution for creating standard BI dashboards.
– AI/BI Genie: A conversational interface that evolves based on continuous feedback to answer a broad set of business questions.

Integration and Benefits

Databricks AI/BI is built to work seamlessly with the Databricks Data Intelligence Platform, offering several key benefits:
– Unified Governance and Lineage: Integrated with Databricks Unity Catalog, the tool follows the same governance protocols, enabling users to trace data origins and build trust in their analyses.
– Effortless Sharing: Embedded within the Databricks IAM platform, the tool allows secure sharing without needing additional user licenses.
– High Performance: Optimisations within Databricks SQL data warehouses and the Photon engine aim to deliver high-performance analytics across various data volumes, eliminating the need for external data extraction.

Industry Adoption

Companies like SEGA have already adopted Databricks AI/BI. Felix Baker, Head of Data Services at SEGA Europe, explained, “We’re using Databricks AI/BI to help decision-makers ask ad-hoc questions in real time about consumer behaviour, without needing our data experts to construct dashboards and queries. AI/BI will enable us to democratise data, increase productivity, and enhance the speed of data-driven decision-making throughout SEGA.”

Availability

Databricks AI/BI is available to all Databricks SQL Pro and Serverless customers at no additional cost beyond warehouse compute expenses. AI/BI Dashboards is currently generally available, while AI/BI Genie is in public preview.

For more information, interested parties can visit Databricks’ official website.

Databricks continues to push the boundaries of data analytics, aiming to simplify and democratise access through its AI-powered BI solutions. With tools like AI/BI, organisations can expect to gain deeper and more actionable insights from their data.

Databricks is co-founded by the creators of notable AI frameworks such as Lakehouse, Apache Spark™, Delta Lake, and MLflow, and serves over 60% of Fortune 500 companies.