Data and analytics have become second nature to most businesses, but merely having access to the vast volumes of data from these devices will no longer suffice. Leading enterprises realize that the speed of data presents a new frontier for competitive differentiation. It is imperative for organizations to reduce time-to-insights to gain a competitive advantage by responding decisively to competitors, fine-tuning operations, and serving fickle customers.

Companies have had only mixed results in their decades-long quest to make better decisions by harnessing enterprise data. But as a new generation of technologies make it easier than ever to unlock the value of business information, change is coming. We’ve already reaped gains at Hitachi Vantara, where I run a global IT team that supports 11,000 employees and helps more than 10,000 customers rapidly scale digital businesses.

I’m starting to hear questions like: “What comes next?” “Do things go back to the way they were?” “Are some of the changes wrought by the pandemic here to stay?” I think we all know part of the answer: there is no going (all the way) back. In the analog world, sure, we need some things to revert to bounce back. We need to revitalize retail, tourism and hospitality to get our economies moving again.

Customer success is much more than a function.

With summer just around the corner, things are really heating up. But you’re in luck because this month BigQuery is supplying a cooler full of ice cold refreshments with this release of user-friendly SQL capabilities. We are pleased to announce three categories of BigQuery user-friendly SQL launches: Powerful Analytics Features, Flexible Schema Handling, and New Geospatial Tools.