News
Big Data Pioneer MapR Facing Financial Peril, Uncertain Future
- By Becky Nagel
- May 30, 2019
The future Silicon Valley-based Big Data unicorn MapR appears to be in crisis.
Founded in 2009 and once worth more than $1 billion, the company's staff is facing layoffs and could very well close its Santa Clara, Calif., headquarters, news reports say.
MapR's platform had shifted last year to take advantage of providing data services for the enterprise AI and analytics markets, stating, "MapR's newest innovations enable data scientists and developers to power distributed AI and analytics by leveraging all data for more impactful results," but it doesn't appear that the shift resonated with clients quickly enough for the company's bottom line.
According to this report today from Silicon Angle's Paul Gillin, the company had "extremely poor results" in the last quarter, and the company also lost a hoped-for investor.
Some salespeople have already been laid off, reports state.
Despite the dire news, the company appears to be continuing improvements to its products, recently announcing new AI and machine learning enhancements for the platform and improving integration with Kubernetes.
More information on MapR's platform and offerings can be found here.
About the Author
Becky Nagel is vice president of AI for 1105 Media, where she specializes in training internal and external customers on maximizing their business potential via a wide variety of generative AI technologies as well as developing cutting-edge AI content and events. She's the author of "ChatGPT Prompt 101 Guide for Business Uses," regularly leads research studies on generative AI business usage, and serves as the director of AI Boardroom, a new resource for C-level executives looking to excel in the AI era. Prior to her current position she was a technical leader for 1105 Media's Web, advertising and production teams as well as editorial director for a suite of enterprise technology publications, including serving as founding editor of PureAI.com. She has 20 years of enterprise technology journalism experience, and regularly speaks and writes about generative AI, AI, edge computing and other cutting-edge technologies. She can be reached at [email protected].