The Need for Flexible Data Management: Why Is Data Flexibility So Important?

We live in an era of big data. Amazingly, statistics show that around 90 percent of this data is only two years old. That indicates that businesses, moving forward, will need to anticipate using more and more of it.

However, Data Management and structuring are notoriously complex. Further studies indicate that only around 5 percent of businesses feel they have Data Management under control. For industries such as sports, education, and hospitality, numbers are always rising.

Data flexibility is becoming a significant concern. While automated data services are coming into the broader mainstream, it is Data Quality, too, which is concerning to big business. Big data will be worth at least $274 billion by 2022. Therefore, it stands to reason that it is worth managing and processing such data correctly.

What are some of the common challenges companies face with data flexibility? Why is flexible Data Management so crucial for the years to come? Let’s take a closer look.

Data, of course, plays a central role in analytics. Marketing, usage, and budgeting, for example, all rely on data pooling to some extent. However, how companies use and manage this data may impact the quality of their reports.

There are two rival concepts with regard to big data. One is the data warehouse, where information is stored in a refined and logical fashion. It may, for example, be akin to a library organization system.

The other is the data lake. This, as you may imagine, is more flexible. It is where data is free to move around, much like the molecules in water. Data in a warehouse faces pigeonholing and a lack of movement.

In previous years, data warehousing has proven useful. This type of data filing may, on the surface, appear organized. However, there are arguments that data is not so easy to file away.

A data lake model considers the statistic that at least 80 percent of data in the corporate sphere is free moving. This statistic is, perhaps bizarrely, more than 20 years old. Some may argue that data is freer moving now than ever before.

A management platform based on a data lake model gives analysts unlimited scope. At least, that is the hope. While some organization is healthy, data warehousing through outdated systems can choke your possibilities. Companies may benefit from a more flexible platform, offering you access to historical data as well as current numbers.

It may be an obvious point to make, but scalable Data Management is immediately scalable. Data in the value of up to 2.5 quintillion bytes is generated every day. Further research shows that data storage will need to make room for more than 44 ZB worldwide.

A ZB is a zettabyte.