Need smarter insights in your inbox? Join our weekly newsletters to get solely what issues to enterprise AI, knowledge, and safety leaders. Subscribe Now
Doc databases are an more and more necessary sort of know-how within the gen AI period.
A doc database is a kind of NoSQL database that doesn’t depend on rows and columns like a conventional relational database, as a substitute it makes use of the JSON (JavaScript Object Notation) format. There are a number of distributors that develop doc databases together with MongoDB, which now has a proprietary closed supply know-how. In an effort to open up the market, Microsoft started growing its personal doc database generally known as DocumentDB and made it open supply in January of this yr. This week, DocumentDB is transferring to the Linux Basis the place it has additionally gained the backing of Microsoft’s cloud rivals AWS and Google.
The transfer creates the primary vendor-neutral open supply different to MongoDB that has the potential to avoid wasting enterprises cash, whereas additionally eliminating database vendor lock-in. Doc databases are necessary for AI apps for duties equivalent to chats, context and reminiscence.
“AI apps are all about semi-structured knowledge and doc databases are goal constructed for it,” Kirill Gavrylyuk, vice chairman at Microsoft and DocumentDB’s major architect, informed VentureBeat “However there isn’t any open supply commonplace engine for doc databases, like what PostgreSQL is for relational databases.”
AI Scaling Hits Its Limits
Energy caps, rising token prices, and inference delays are reshaping enterprise AI. Be part of our unique salon to find how high groups are:
- Turning vitality right into a strategic benefit
- Architecting environment friendly inference for actual throughput good points
- Unlocking aggressive ROI with sustainable AI methods
Safe your spot to remain forward: https://bit.ly/4mwGngO
Delivering the promise of open supply doc database on the Linux Basis
Microsoft initially launched the open-source DocumentDB venture in January of 2025.
The venture was hosted throughout the Microsoft org on GitHub and had been producing broad business curiosity over the course of the yr. Having an open-source venture isn’t nearly code or licensing, it’s additionally about contributions and neighborhood.
“Underneath the Linux Basis’s governance, DocumentDB will profit from vendor neutrality and broader collaboration,” Gavrylyuk mentioned.
Microsoft isn’t simply dumping code both. Gavrylyuk emphasised that Microsoft will proceed to speculate closely within the venture and can proceed to have sturdy illustration within the Technical Steering Committee to assist form the imaginative and prescient and roadmap of the venture.
“By becoming a member of the Linux Basis, a impartial basis, we’re aiming to be extra inviting to the developer neighborhood to contribute and form the course of the venture,” Gavrylyuk mentioned. “Furthermore, by way of the Linux Basis, we need to present an assurance to the developer neighborhood that this venture is right here to remain, open supply, and can proceed to maneuver ahead.”
What’s inside DocumentDB and why it issues for enterprise knowledge professionals
Other than its open-source nature, there may be one other vital aspect that makes the database significantly engaging to enterprises. As a substitute of being a wholly new database know-how, it’s based mostly on the open-source PostgreSQL database.
PostgreSQL has emerged to grow to be one of the extensively deployed open supply databases of all time and has newfound adoption within the AI period. DocumentDB features a PostgreSQL extension that brings first-class BSON (Binary JSON) datatype help to PostgreSQL. It additionally integrates an extension that provides doc fashion queries help to PostgreSQL and index administration. The PostgreSQL base signifies that enterprises can profit from PostgreSQL’s mature ecosystem of instruments, monitoring methods and backup options. The PostgreSQL basis additionally supplies ACID (Atomicity, Consistency, Isolation and Sturdiness) compliance and confirmed replication capabilities that handle enterprise considerations about knowledge consistency.
DocumentDB additionally has a gateway that makes the database suitable with open supply MongoDB drivers for any language. Gavrylyuk famous that Doc DB doesn’t but have full compatibility with every little thing in MongoDB, however there may be extra work to return.
“Full compatibility with MongoDB drivers is a vital purpose of the venture as mirrored within the Linux Basis DocumentDB constitution,” he mentioned. “This coupled with the true open supply vendor impartial governance of the venture will assist the broader doc database ecosystem thrive, benefitting all people within the ecosystem, together with MongoDB Inc.”
Simply to be clear, Amazon DocumentDB isn’t the identical factor
Whereas Amazon is among the many backers of the brand new Linux Basis DocumentDB venture, it truly already has its personal DocumentDB database.
The Amazon DocumentDB database predates the Microsoft-led know-how, having been first introduced in 2019. Amazon DocumentDB lately debuted a serveless service that goals to speed up agentic AI.
Whereas the DocumentDB venture, stewarded by Linux Basis, has an analogous title to Amazon DocumentDB, it makes use of completely different software program below the hood.
“Amazon DocumentDB is a MongoDB API-compatible doc database constructed by AWS,” Rashim Gupta, Sr. Supervisor, Product Administration at AWS, informed VentureBeat. “The Linux Basis venture, then again, whereas additionally being MongoDB suitable, makes use of an open supply engine that’s constructed as an extension on PostgreSQL. It is a completely different engine than the one utilized in Amazon DocumentDB.”
Gupta famous that AWS will proceed to put money into each Amazon DocumentDB and open supply DocumentDB akin to the way it invests in Amazon OpenSearch Service and neighborhood OpenSearch. Shifting ahead, he mentioned that AWS will begin contributing Amazon DocumentDB improvements to the open supply venture and undertake options and capabilities from the open supply DocumentDB engine to its managed Amazon DocumentDB service over time.
AI workloads drive pressing want for database options
The timing displays rising enterprise demand for doc databases to energy AI purposes.
The venture already incorporates Microsoft Analysis’s DiskANN (Disk Approximate Nearest Neighbor) vector indexing algorithms and semantic operators developed for PostgreSQL’s AI capabilities.
This offers DocumentDB fast aggressive benefits for AI workloads whereas avoiding the licensing prices that may probably make proprietary options costly for data-intensive purposes.
“Microsoft closely invests in open supply AI contributions throughout the board,” Gavrylyuk mentioned. “We’re investing within the AI capabilities of DocumentDB in addition to the broader PostgreSQL ecosystem with precedence.”
What it means for enterprise knowledge groups
For enterprises seeking to scale back database vendor dependence, DocumentDB supplies a strategic hedge towards potential closed supply proprietary know-how. IT leaders ought to start evaluating DocumentDB in improvement environments to grasp migration complexity for his or her particular workloads.
Organizations constructing new AI purposes have the chance to architect round DocumentDB from the beginning, avoiding potential closed-source know-how lock-in fully whereas gaining PostgreSQL’s confirmed enterprise reliability and ecosystem advantages.
For enterprises seeking to cleared the path in AI, this information means entry to cutting-edge doc database capabilities with out the seller lock-in dangers which have traditionally constrained database technique choices.
