Dell, Intel Corporation, and Revolution Analytics today announced the creation of the Big Data Innovation Center in Singapore. The new center brings together expertise across all three organizations to provide extensive training programs, proof-of-concept capabilities and solution development support on big data and predictive analytic innovations for Asia market.

In a world where analytics, big data and cloud are converging, the need to manage, monitor and predict business outcomes and market readiness is also changing. The prevalence of tablets, smart phones and social media also increase the urgency to mine intelligence from the tons of raw data, in turn prodding more companies and governments to beef up their big data plans.

Industry analyst firm International Data Corp (IDC) projects the global big data technology and services market to grow at a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 31.7 percent – about seven times the rate of the overall information and communications technology (ICT) market – with revenues reaching US$23.8 billion by 2016. IDC expects big data spending in the Asia-Pacific excluding Japan to reach US$603 million in 2013, up 42.6 percent over 2012.

“The global market for big data analytics is growing at a rapid pace, and businesses in Singapore are uniquely suited to capitalize on this trend,” said Laurence Liew, Managing Director of Revolution Analytics Asia-Pacific. “The launch of the Big Data Innovation Center is in line with the Singapore government’s focus on big data and predictive analytics, and we are pleased to partner with Dell and Intel and as our big data analytics training platform. We look forward to delivering the necessary skill sets and big data analytics training to companies, while tapping on the vast expertise from Dell and Intel.”

The Big Data Innovation Center will be housed at the Dell Solution Center (DSC) in Singapore, where training will be done on a big data stack that includes Dell infrastructure using latest Intel® Xeon® E5 processor-based servers, Intel 10GbE networking and Intel Solid State Drives with Cache Acceleration Software, the Intel® Distribution for Apache Hadoop* Software and Revolution Analytics Enterprise R predictive analytics software. Revolution Analytics will also use the center to provide a state-of-the-art big data analytics platform to train professionals to become data scientists.

The launch of the Big Data Innovation Center provides the platform for companies to test-run big data initiatives and proof-of-concepts for deployment. It will also see the commencement of training where participants will be equipped with the necessary skills to improve the quality of data mining across a wider range of platforms from a larger pool of sources. Apart from the regular training courses, candidates can also attend seminars, workshops and events hosted at the Dell Solution Center.

“Intel is committed to providing the industry with a better foundation from which it can push the limits of innovation and realize the transformational opportunity of big data,” said Boyd Davis, vice president and general manager of Intel's Datacenter Software Division. “The collaboration with Dell and Revolution Analytics are a realization of our vision for helping customers, organizations, governments and ISVs in the Southeast Asia region to maximize the growing market opportunities and drive new projects forward.”

Dell has transformed itself into a solutions company, having announced 20 acquisitions within the last three to four years to expand its enterprise capabilities. “We have robust, industry-standard x86 servers for big data requirements,” said Sumir Bhatia, Dell’s enterprise solutions director for South Asia. “We have set up what could be the industry’s first proof-of-concept stack on x86 infrastructure with the Intel Distribution for Apache Hadoop and Revolution Analytics engine. Companies that need to test-run their big data workloads and initiatives can make use of this facility to understand how big a difference it could make in their business.”