MongoDB Expands Azure Integrations, Boosts Real-Time Analytics And GenAI

The database and development platform provider is announcing a number of initiatives at Microsoft Ignite this week that make it easier for customers and partners to work with MongoDB on Azure cloud.

MongoDB is extending the scope of integrations between its cloud database development platform and Microsoft Azure, a move the company says will make it easier for partners and customers to build real-time data analytics links and develop generative AI applications.

In a series of announcements today at this week’s Microsoft Ignite conference, MongoDB is integrating the MongoDB Atlas cloud database with Microsoft’s Azure OpenAI services and launching its MongoDB Enterprise Advanced database management tools on the Azure Marketplace.

MongoDB said the new integrations will provide partners and customers with greater flexibility in data development on Azure – particularly to help meet the exploding demand for data for AI and generative AI applications.

“I think the pace is phenomenal, things are changing daily,” said Alan Chhabra, MongoDB executive vice president of worldwide partners, speaking in an interview with CRN about the rapid growth of AI and GenAI development. He said experimentation with GenAI, especially within larger enterprises, “is through the roof.”

Despite competing with Microsoft and its Azure Cosmos database, MongoDB has been steadily expanding its alliance with Microsoft – along with its partnerships with Amazon Web Services and Google Cloud – in recent years.

Last year MongoDB extended its multi-year strategic partnership with Microsoft, committing to a broad range of initiatives including close cooperation between the two companies’ sales teams and making it easier to migrate database workloads to MongoDB Atlas on Azure. That followed steps in 2022 that allowed developers to work with MongoDB Atlas through the Azure Marketplace and Azure Portal.

“Microsoft has become our fastest growing partnership,” Chhabra said, noting how MongoDB and Microsoft sales representatives cooperate in selling MongoDB for Azure, particularly for AI and GenAI development.

At the Ignite event Tuesday MongoDB announced that customers building applications powered by retrieval-augmented generation (RAG) can now select MongoDB Atlas as a vector store in the Microsoft Azure AI Foundry, combining MongoDB Atlas’s vector capabilities with generative AI tools and services from Microsoft Azure and Azure Open AI Service.

That makes it easier for customers to enhance large language models (LLMs) with proprietary data and build unique chatbots, copilots, internal applications, or customer-facing portals that are grounded in up-to-date enterprise data and context, the company said.

Chhabra said the new capabilities are designed to help customers develop and deploy GenAI applications. “It's not easy. There's a lot of confusion. There's also a lot of experimentation, because everyone knows they need to use it [but] they're not sure how.

“This integration will make it way easier and seamless for customers to deploy RAG applications leveraging their proprietary data in the combination of their LLMs,” Chhabra said.

In May MongoDB launched the MongoDB AI Applications Program (MAAP) that provides a complete technology stack, services and other resources to help businesses develop and deploy at scale applications with advanced generative AI capabilities.

Chhabra said MongoDB systems integration and consulting partners will benefit from the new integrations “because we're making it easier for them to deploy Gen AI pilots and help them take it to production for customers.”

While large enterprises are conducting lots of AI development and experimentation in-house, Chhabra said SMBs are looking for more complete packaged AI and GenAI solutions.

“I believe there's a large play for ISV application [developers] who are building purpose-built GenAI applications in the cloud on Azure, leveraging the MongoDB stack, leveraging our MAAP program,” Chhabra said. “So instead of customers having to build, they can buy GenAI solutions. When big companies like Microsoft work with cutting-edge growing companies like MongoDB, we make it easier for customers and partners to deploy GenAI [and] the whole ecosystem benefits.”

In another announcement at Ignite, MongoDB said users looking to maximize insights from operational data can now do so in near real-time with Open Mirroring in Microsoft Fabric for MongoDB Atlas. That connection keeps data in sync between MongoDB Atlas and OneLake in Microsoft Fabric, enabling the generation of near real-time analytics, AI-based predictions, and business intelligence reports, according to MongoDB.

And the announced launch of MongoDB Enterprise Advanced on Azure Marketplace for Azure Arc-enabled Kubernetes applications gives customers more flexibility to build and operate applications across on-premises, hybrid, multi-cloud, and edge Kubernetes environments.

Eliassen Group, a Reading, Mass.-based strategic consulting company that provides business, clinical, and IT services, will use the new Microsoft integrations to drive innovation and provide greater flexibility to their clients, MongoDB said.

“We’ve witnessed the incredible impact MongoDB Atlas has had on our customers’ businesses, and we’ve been equally impressed by Microsoft Azure AI Foundry's capabilities. Now that these powerful platforms are integrated, we’re excited to combine the best of both worlds to build AI solutions that our customers will love just as much as we do,” said Kolby Kappes, vice president - emerging technology, at Eliassen Group, in a statement.

The new extensions to the Microsoft alliance come a little more than a month after MongoDB debuted MongoDB 8.0, a significant update to the company’s core database that offered improved scalability, optimized performance and enhanced enterprise-grade security.