Teradata throws itself further into Hadoop with Think Big buy

Teradata, a company that sells data-warehousing hardware and software for storing and serving corporate information, has pulled out its wallet for another big data business. Instead of buying software, as it did last month, today Teradata reached for a big data consulting company called Think Big Analytics.

The move could add to Teradata’s credibility as a company that works with, not in opposition to, Hadoop — that open-source software for storing, processing, and analyzing large amounts of data — as well as other emerging open-source tools like Spark that don’t require costly proprietary hardware.

Terms weren’t disclosed, so it’s unclear how much Teradata is paying.

Today’s news comes two months after Teradata announced that it had bought Hadapt and Revelytix, two startups with software that could help people work with large data sets.

This latest Hadoop scoop-up follows on with Teradata’s latest thinking about the open-source technology.

“We started out thinking that maybe Hadoop can be that single platform for all my analytics, but I think what we’re starting to realize is it’s really the analytical ecosystems that are going to make a difference,” Chris Twogood, vice president of products and services marketing at Teradata, said in an interview with VentureBeat last week. And Hadoop is only one part of the ecosystems companies can use. Teradata wants to help companies work with Hadoop for certain uses, such as storing log data and moving its data warehouses at the same time.

And indeed Twogood said it’s fair to expect Teradata to keep making acquisitions. He said Teradata already employ consultants who understand Hadoop, but as more companies implement big data, some more technicians with a solid rep couldn’t hurt.

Based in Mountain View, Calif., Think Big revealed a $3 million funding round in February 2013. Former Cisco executive Dan Scheinman invested alongside WI Harper Group. Early customers included NetApp and Quantcast.

Teradata’s investors didn’t seem fazed by the deal. Teradata stock this morning was trading less than 1 percent above yesterday’s closing price, at $46.24.