<div>
  <ul>
    <li>
      <p>
        Snowflake, a cloud-based data and AI infrastructure company, has signed a definitive agreement to acquire Datavolo, a provider of multimodal data pipelines for AI, for an undisclosed amount.
      </p>
    </li>
    <li>
      <p>
        Datavolo utilizes Apache NiFi, an open-source project developed by the NSA, to create a platform that automates data flows between enterprise data sources. 
        The company's technology processes, extracts, cleans, transforms, and enriches data for GenAI applications
        .
      </p>
    </li>
    <li>
      <p>
        Following the acquisition, Snowflake plans to integrate Datavolo into its platform to enhance its data engineering capabilities, allowing customers to replace complex point-to-point connectors with flexible, reusable pipelines. The company will also maintain the Apache NiFi project and aims to accelerate its presence in the public sector.
      </p>
    </li>
    <li>
      <p>
        <b>Analyst QuickTake:</b>
         This strategic acquisition aligns with Snowflake's focus on the public sector and follows its previous acquisition of 
        <a href="https://sp-edge.com/updates/33819">
          Night Shift Development
        </a>
         in September 2024. This move aimed to enhance decision-making for government agencies by establishing a dedicated entity for the US public sector, enabling new methods of collaboration with public organizations.
      </p>
      <p>
      </p>
    </li>
  </ul>
  <p>
  </p>
</div>


<div>
  <p>
    <a href="https://investors.snowflake.com/news/news-details/2024/Snowflake-Agrees-to-Acquire-Open-Data-Integration-Platform-Datavolo/default.aspx">
      Press release
    </a>
    <a href="https://techcrunch.com/2024/11/20/snowflake-snaps-up-data-management-company-datavolo/">
      TechCrunch
    </a>
  </p>
</div>


Generative AI Infrastructure

ANALYST_QUICK_TAKE

<div>
 <p>Snowflake, a company specializing in cloud-based data and AI infrastructure, has agreed to acquire Datavolo, a provider of multimodal data pipelines for AI, for an undisclosed sum.</p>
 <p>Datavolo uses Apache NiFi, an open-source project initiated by the NSA, to develop a platform that streamlines data flows between enterprise data sources. Datavolo's technology is designed to process, extract, clean, transform, and enrich data for GenAI applications.</p>
 <p>In the wake of the acquisition, Snowflake intends to integrate Datavolo into its own platform, thereby enhancing its data engineering capacities. This will allow customers to swap out complex, direct connectors for more flexible and reusable pipelines. Snowflake also plans to continue maintaining the Apache NiFi project, while also aiming to expand its presence in the public sector.</p>
</div> <p><b>Analyst QuickTake:<br>
</b> This strategic acquisition aligns with Snowflake's focus on the public sector and follows its previous acquisition of <a href="https:<br>
//sp-edge.com/updates/33819"> Night Shift Development </a> in September 2024. This move aimed to enhance decision-making for government agencies by establishing a dedicated entity for the US public sector, enabling new methods of collaboration with public organizations.</p>

Snowflake acquires Datavolo to enhance data integration capabilities for undisclosed sum

INCUMBENTS_PRESENT

PROMINENT_CATEGORY

<div>
 <p>AI governance firm, Saidot, has partnered with Microsoft Azure AI to offer Azure users integrated governance solutions. Saidot's new 'Model Catalogue' feature will be introduced through this partnership, allowing users to import models, manage their use cases, and connect models to risks and datasets.</p>
 <p>This feature, available from December, will assist organizations in automating governance tasks and ensuring adherence to AI regulatory standards. The partnership will facilitate cross-functional AI governance among various roles - data scientists, product engineers, legal teams, and business teams.</p>
 <p>Microsoft's single and multi-cloud customers will benefit from a unified governance approach across diverse cloud environments thanks to this collaboration.</p>
</div> <p><b>Analyst QuickTake:<br>
 </b> The round builds on Saidot's EUR 1.5 million (~USD 1.6 million) seed funding round in <a href="https:<br>
//www.saidot.ai/insights/saidot-raises-seed-round-to-grow-its-ai-governance-platform"> October 2023 </a> . The funds were earmarked to grow the sales of its AI governance Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) platform in Europe and launch new tools to aid enterprise and government customers in evaluating and implementing safety systems for their GenAI systems.</p>

Saidot partners with Microsoft Azure AI to enhance AI governance solutions

<div>
 <p>GenAI security platform Prompt Security successfully secured USD 18 million in a Series A funding round. The funding round was led by Jump Capital and included participants such as Hetz Ventures, Ridge Ventures, Okta, and F5. This boost in funding raises the company's total funds to USD 23 million.</p>
 <p>Prompt Security plans to utilize the raised funds to enhance its security solutions. The funds will also be used to expand its operations geographically and increase its industry footprint.</p>
</div> <p><b>Analyst QuickTake:<br>
 </b> This marks the company's second round of funding this year, following its emergence from stealth and a successful USD 5 million raise in <a href="https:<br>
//sp-edge.com/updates/25877"> January 2024 </a> . Investor confidence was further bolstered in <a href="https:<br>
//www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/prompt-security-launches-first-comprehensive-security-and-governance-solution-for-microsoft-365-copilot-302237623.html"> September 2024 </a> , when the company launched the first comprehensive security and governance solution tailored specifically for Microsoft 365 Copilot.</p>

Prompt Security raises USD 18 million in Series A funding to improve GenAI security solutions

<div>
 <p>The US-China Economic and Security Review Commission (USCC) has recommended a cooperative effort, similar to the Manhattan Project, for the development of artificial general intelligence (AGI). The aim of this initiative is to strengthen the US' technological capabilities in competition with China, with a focus on public-private partnerships.</p>
 <p>The Commission suggests that AI development may be expedited by simplifying processes for obtaining data center permits. According to the report, current energy infrastructure is a bottleneck for the training of large AI models.</p>
 <p>The USCC also proposes removing the "de minimis" trade exemption. This exemption currently allows Chinese goods valued at less than USD 800 to enter the US with minimal inspections. With around 1.4 billion shipments entering the US annually, the Commission has raised concerns about the potential for unchecked goods.</p>
 <p>The USCC, founded by Congress in the year 2000, provides yearly suggestions on US-China relations. It aims to aid lawmakers in understanding the economic and strategic competition with China.</p>
</div>

US Commission proposes Manhattan Project-style AI development initiative

<div>
 <p>C3 AI, a provider of the integrated LLMOps platform, announced its partnership with Microsoft during the Ignite 2024 conference. The collaboration aims to increase the uptake of enterprise AI solutions on the Microsoft Azure cloud platform.</p>
 <p>As part of the partnership, C3 AI's Enterprise AI applications will be technically integrated into Microsoft's Commercial Cloud Portal. The collaboration will also see joint product development through regular roadmap alignment and combined sales and marketing initiatives.</p>
 <p>With this agreement, Microsoft is set to become C3 AI's preferred cloud provider. In return, C3 AI will become a preferred provider of AI application software on Azure. Several C3 AI Enterprise solutions will be immediately available, including those for Energy Management, ESG, Reliability, and Generative AI applications.</p>
</div>

C3 AI and Microsoft expand partnership at Ignite 2024 conference to boost enterprise AI adoption on Azure

<div>
 <p>KPMG revealed a USD 100 million collaboration with Google Cloud aiming to amplify its enterprise AI services in the coming four years.</p>
 <p>This alliance aims to create AI agents and foster staff training leveraging Google's technology. Not all the investment will benefit Google Cloud as the majority will be deployed for internal projects. Over the previous two years, KPMG has experienced a tenfold surge in bookings for services related to Google Cloud.</p>
  
</div>

KPMG partners with Google Cloud for USD 100 million enterprise AI services initiative

<div>
 <p>Weights &amp; Biases, the LLMOps platform, has collaborated with Microsoft to enhance its integration with Azure OpenAI Service to improve LLM fine-tuning capabilities. This expanded partnership enables developers to track fine-tuning jobs automatically, compare model versions, and evaluate LLM-powered apps within the Azure environment. New features include access to Azure OpenAI Service models like GPT-4 and an integrated development experience through Azure Native Integrations, currently available in private preview. The collaboration aims at streamlining AI model development workflows by allowing teams to manage and optimize their models within Azure AI Foundry, ensuring high performance and accuracy for enterprise-specific requirements.</p>
</div> <p><b>Analyst QuickTake:<br>
</b> Weights &amp; Biases has been focused on augmenting its model deployment capabilities. The news follows its partnership with FriendliAI to simplify model deployment through dedicated endpoints, removing the need to load models manually ( <a href="https:<br>
//sp-edge.com/updates/30734"> June 2024 </a> ). Previously, the company introduced " <a href="https:<br>
//sp-edge.com/updates/28680"> W&amp;B Weave </a> ,” a toolkit designed to assist software developers in deploying GenAI applications.</p>

Weights & Biases partners with Microsoft to improve LLM fine-tuning capabilities on Azure OpenAI

<div>
 <p>IBM Research has launched two open-source low-rank adapters (LoRAs) for the Granite 3.0 Instruct 8 billion model. The adapters, available on Hugging Face, are part of the new research playground, Granite Experiments.</p>
 <p>The adapters are designed for different purposes: one estimates the likelihood of correct model answers acting as a weather forecaster, and the other identifies potential hallucinations in retrieval-augmented generation (RAG) applications by providing source citations and ratings for every generated sentence. Users can activate or deactivate the LoRAs as required.</p>
 <p>The goal of these experimental adapters is to provide developers with greater control over AI content generation and enhance model dependability. According to IBM, if these adapters are effective, their training data will be included in the forthcoming Granite 3.1 version, which could potentially cut down the standard year-long AI model update cycle.</p>
</div>

IBM releases two adapters for Granite to control AI outputs

<div>
 <p>AI networking chip producer Enfabrica has raised USD 115 million in Series C funding with Spark Capital leading the round. The funding round saw participation from new investors including Arm, Cisco Investments, Samsung Catalyst Fund, Maverick Silicon, and VentureTech Alliance, as well as returning investors Atreides Management and Sutter Hill Ventures.</p>
 <p>The company plans to use the funding to boost the mass production of its ACF SuperNIC chips, scale up its global research and development team, and extend its product line development for next-generation products.</p>
 <p>Enfabrica also revealed that its Accelerated Compute Fabric (ACF) SuperNIC chip and pilot systems will be available in Q1 2025. Touted to provide a connectivity of 3.2 Tbps, the chip offers four times the bandwidth and multi-path resiliency than its counterparts.</p>
 <p>The firm positions itself as the pioneer in creating a ground-up SuperNIC chip which will serve as the backbone for AI workloads including training, inference, and retrieval-augmented generation (RAG).</p>
 </div>

Enfabrica raises USD 115 million in Series C funding; announces ACF SuperNIC chip

<div>
 <p>Zilliz, a vector database firm, announced upgrades to its cloud service intended to cut costs and simplification for enterprise GenAI implementations. The new features aim at enhancing efficiency in vector database management for production uses.</p>
 <p>The recently introduced features include an automatic indexing system to eliminate manual parameter tuning, an algorithm optimizer for IVF and graph-based vector retrieval, along with a hybrid search function that merges vector similarity and keyword-based searches. The firm has also instituted a hierarchical storage system for local disks and object storage.</p>
 <p>Zilliz mentions that the recent updates can provide up to a 3x speed increase over implementations that are not optimized, streamline operational complexity using consolidated search infrastructure, and provide lower storage costs compared to typical in-memory vector databases. The firm anticipates a reduction in total vector database solution costs by a factor of 100 over a five-year span.</p>
</div> <p><b>Analyst QuickTake:<br>
 </b> Zilliz has been focused on improving its vector database management capabilities. In <a href="https:<br>
//sp-edge.com/updates/33468"> September 2024 </a> , the company added vector migration services for data transfer to address challenges in scaling GenAI applications from prototype to production. Further, the company <a href="https:<br>
//www.secureitworld.com/news-post/zilliz-cloud-enhances-enterprise-ai-infrastructure-with-key-features-for-production-genai-workloads/"> expanded </a> its global infrastructure by adding a new AWS region in Tokyo, increasing its coverage to 12 regions worldwide.</p>

All Updates

Snowflake acquires Datavolo to enhance data integration capabilities for undisclosed sum

Saidot partners with Microsoft Azure AI to enhance AI governance solutions

Prompt Security raises USD 18 million in Series A funding to improve GenAI security solutions

US Commission proposes Manhattan Project-style AI development initiative

C3 AI and Microsoft expand partnership at Ignite 2024 conference to boost enterprise AI adoption on Azure

KPMG partners with Google Cloud for USD 100 million enterprise AI services initiative

Weights & Biases partners with Microsoft to improve LLM fine-tuning capabilities on Azure OpenAI

IBM releases two adapters for Granite to control AI outputs

Enfabrica raises USD 115 million in Series C funding; announces ACF SuperNIC chip

Zilliz introduces cost optimization features for vector database cloud service

Generative AI Infrastructure

Snowflake acquires Datavolo to enhance data integration capabilities for undisclosed sum

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