Dipti Borkar is a giant information veteran who has been there and performed that. From stints at NoSQL database corporations like Couchbase and MarkLogic to information platforms like Alluxio and Ahana, Borkar has gathered precious expertise at a number of phases of the sport. Now at Microsoft with the title of Vice President and Common Supervisor of Microsoft OneLake and Material ISVs, Borkar finds herself named one in all BigDATAwire‘s Folks to Look ahead to 2025.
Borkar lately labored with BigDATAwire on a Q&A. Here’s what she needed to say:
BigDATAwire: First, congratulations in your choice as a 2025 BigDATAwire Particular person to Watch! You have got had a tremendous profession to date, with stops at Intuit, IBM, MarkLogic, Couchbase, Alluxio, and Ahana earlier than becoming a member of Microsoft in 2022. How did all these huge information experiences put together you in your present position at Microsoft?
Dipti Borkar: I’m grateful for this recognition. There are such a lot of movers and shakers on this area, and it’s an honor to be included on this record. Whereas I’ve had a spread of experiences previous to Microsoft from Fortune 100 corporations to quick rising startups to even founding my very own, all of them centered round Knowledge and platform corporations. Knowledge continues to be the muse for enterprises and much more so now with genAI. I imagine depth in your area is absolutely necessary to make knowledgeable choices, constructing credibility particularly with clients and driving breakthrough innovation. Whereas I’ve been very profitable with startups, with an IPO and a strategic exit, I realized a key management trait from each expertise – adapting to vary. This has by no means been extra related as AI is reworking our world. Microsoft is main that transformation for our clients and it’s superb to have the ability to play a component on this once-in-a-decade alternative.
BDW: Microsoft has an enormous number of choices throughout huge information, analytics, and AI. What’s the firm’s greatest benefit in the case of profitable enterprise in huge information, analytics, and AI?
DB: Microsoft has a spread of choices in information, analytics and AI. Microsoft’s greatest benefit lies in its complete and absolutely built-in imaginative and prescient for an end-to-end AI stack, spanning from cloud infrastructure to information to AI-driven functions with safety and governance at each layer. Copilots are deeply embedded into each providing. On the information layer, Microsoft Material not solely gives a seamless SaaS unified information platform for analytics, together with real-time analytics, but in addition operational use instances with the state of artwork SQL database provided as a workload in Material. This complete method permits our clients to spend much less time integrating a spread of providers and merchandise and extra time getting actual worth from their information and enabling AI efficiencies.
BDW: Microsoft has nice partnerships and in addition nice builders. When launching a brand new Azure Cloud providing, how do you resolve when you must construct internally versus when you must accomplice with an present vendor?
DB: Nice query. This choice is one each product chief makes as they envision executing on their roadmap. Microsoft embraces our companions. A stronger ecosystem round Microsoft means higher experiences for our clients. The reply relies on a number of key parameters that embody time to market, if the part is a core basis or a distinct segment use case, and if there open-source tasks which have addressed an analogous downside. Microsoft Material has embraced open supply. We assist DeltaLake and Apache Iceberg desk codecs for Microsoft OneLake – the place information throughout the client’s information property is managed. However we went a step additional and opened the Microsoft Material platform – the identical platform that our analytics, information manufacturing facility and Energy BI workloads are constructed on – so companions and software program corporations can deliver their capabilities natively into it, giving our clients the good thing about a thriving ecosystem.
BDW: Knowledge lakehouses are rising due to the standardization on the Apache Iceberg format. What’s Microsoft’s technique for supporting Iceberg with OneLake?
DB: With Microsoft Material, Microsoft moved from closed proprietary codecs to open supply desk codecs in order that no information is locked in. However as a cloud chief, we now have clients throughout each desk codecs – DeltaLake and Apache Iceberg. Whereas we began off with the DeltaLake format, we now assist Apache Iceberg as nicely. We imagine that is actually necessary as a result of it meets our clients the place they’re and permits full interoperability throughout information platforms. Microsoft OneLake, sometimes called the “OneDrive for information,” gives a single unified multi-cloud, SaaS information lake for organizations. It helps a number of engines, permitting for varied sorts of compute on a single information lake layer.
BDW: What are you able to inform us about your self exterior of the skilled sphere – distinctive hobbies, favourite locations, and many others.? Is there something about you that your colleagues could be stunned to be taught?
DB: Exterior of labor, I attempt to maximize spending time with my household – husband and two youngsters (11 and 9). We love touring the world collectively – we now have one final marvel of the world left to go to. Journey and music are two issues that actually preserve me going. Whereas there isn’t sufficient time for distinctive hobbies, I did train myself to play the ukulele and revel in strumming and singing with the youngsters. I like all genres of music and maybe my favourite could shock my colleagues – Reggaeton 😊
You’ll be able to learn the remainder of the 2025 Folks to Watch interviews right here.
