Hopsworks
Hopsworks is a Swedish AI platform company that provides an integrated suite for feature engineering, real-time machine learning, and production AI.
Profile
Hopsworks provides a unified platform for building, deploying, and running AI systems, combining a feature store, an AI lakehouse, and MLOps tools.
Hopsworks is a Swedish AI platform company that provides an integrated suite for feature engineering, real-time machine learning, and production AI. Founded in 2016 by Jim Dowling and the team behind the open-source Hops platform at KTH Royal Institute of Technology, the company has evolved from a research project into a commercial product that competes with Databricks, SageMaker, and other MLOps platforms. Its core offerings include a feature store (sub-millisecond retrieval via RonDB), an AI lakehouse supporting Iceberg, Delta, and Hudi formats, and an end-to-end MLOps platform for experiment tracking, model registry, and deployment.
The company claims 9-45x faster reads than Databricks or SageMaker and 10x faster deployment times. As of mid-2026, Hopsworks has not disclosed revenue or headcount publicly, but its customer base includes Zalando, Ericsson, Saab, Paddy Power, America First Credit Union, Karolinska Institutet, and RISE. The company launched a SaaS public preview in 2026, offering free and pay-as-you-go tiers, signaling a shift from on-premise/self-hosted to cloud-native delivery.
No recent funding rounds or valuation data are publicly available; the most recent known round was a $15 million Series A in 2021 led by Creandum. The company faces stiff competition from well-capitalized incumbents and open-source alternatives, and its reliance on a small number of large European customers creates concentration risk.
Who buys this
- Large enterprises with in-house AI/ML teams needing feature management and model deployment
- Financial services firms (e.g., Paddy Power, America First Credit Union) requiring low-latency feature retrieval
- Government and defense organizations (e.g., Saab, Arbetsförmedlingen) with strict data sovereignty requirements
- Healthcare and research institutions (e.g., Karolinska Institutet) managing sensitive data in open formats
- E-commerce and retail companies (e.g., Zalando) running real-time recommendation systems
Publicly disclosed clients
- Zalando
- Ericsson
- Saab
- Paddy Power
- America First Credit Union
- Karolinska Institutet
- RISE
Strengths and what to watch
Strengths
- Unified platform combining feature store, lakehouse, and MLOps reduces toolchain complexity for teams that would otherwise stitch together multiple vendors.
- Sub-millisecond feature retrieval (via RonDB) is a technical differentiator for real-time inference use cases, particularly in finance and e-commerce.
- Open-format support (Iceberg, Delta, Hudi) allows customers to avoid vendor lock-in and work with existing data lakes.
Watch for
- No public revenue or headcount data makes it difficult to assess growth trajectory or compare with well-funded competitors like Databricks ($10B+ valuation) or SageMaker (AWS).
- Customer concentration in Europe (Zalando, Ericsson, Saab, Karolinska) creates geographic and sector risk; limited presence in North America or Asia.
- The shift to SaaS (public preview launched 2026) introduces new operational and pricing challenges; the company must prove it can compete on cloud-native delivery against incumbents with mature SaaS offerings.
Key Information
- Industry
- MLOps
- Founded
- 2016
Frequently Asked Questions
What is Hopsworks and what does it do?
Hopsworks is a Swedish AI platform company that provides a unified platform for building, deploying, and running AI systems. It combines a feature store, an AI lakehouse, and MLOps tools to reduce toolchain complexity for teams.
How does Hopsworks compare to Databricks or SageMaker?
Hopsworks claims 9-45x faster reads than Databricks or SageMaker and 10x faster deployment times. It offers a unified platform with sub-millisecond feature retrieval via RonDB, open-format support, and an end-to-end MLOps suite, competing directly with these incumbents.
What companies use Hopsworks?
Notable Hopsworks customers include Zalando, Ericsson, Saab, Paddy Power, America First Credit Union, Karolinska Institutet, and RISE. These span e-commerce, telecom, defense, finance, healthcare, and research sectors, often requiring low-latency feature retrieval or strict data sovereignty.
What is the Hopsworks feature store and why is it fast?
The Hopsworks feature store enables sub-millisecond feature retrieval for real-time machine learning, using RonDB. This performance is a key differentiator for use cases like finance and e-commerce, where low latency is critical for inference and decision-making.
Does Hopsworks support open data formats?
Yes, Hopsworks supports open formats like Iceberg, Delta, and Hudi in its AI lakehouse. This allows customers to avoid vendor lock-in and work with existing data lakes, making it flexible for organizations with diverse data infrastructure.
Is Hopsworks available as a cloud service?
Hopsworks launched a SaaS public preview in 2026, offering free and pay-as-you-go tiers. This marks a shift from its earlier on-premise and self-hosted delivery to a cloud-native model, though it faces competition from mature SaaS offerings from incumbents.
Sources
- www.hopsworks.ai — Product descriptions (feature store, AI lakehouse, MLOps), customer logos (Zalando, Ericsson, Saab, Paddy Power, America First Credit Union, Karolinska Institutet, RISE), performance claims (sub-ms latency, 9-45x faster reads, 10x faster deployment), SaaS public preview availability.
- techcrunch.com — General TechCrunch homepage accessed to search for Hopsworks funding news; no specific Hopsworks article found.
- techcrunch.com — Funding round tag page accessed to search for Hopsworks-related funding; no Hopsworks article found.
- investors.upwork.com — Upwork Q1 2026 financial results (revenue $195.5M, GSV $987.1M, AI work GSV growth >40% YoY) – included in dossier but not directly relevant to Hopsworks; retained as a source from the dossier.