In-database processing, sometimes referred to as in-database analytics, refers to the integration of data analytics

Analytics

Analytics is the application of computer technology, operational research, and statistics to solve problems in business and industry. Analytics is carried out within an information system: while, in the past, statistics and mathematics could be studied without computers and software, analytics has...

 into data warehousing functionality. In-database processing eliminates the overhead of moving large data sets from the enterprise data warehouse to a separate analytic software application, providing significant performance benefits.

In-database processing accelerates data analysis, making it relevant for applications requiring high-throughput, real-time advanced analytics, including fraud detection, transaction processing, pricing and margin analysis, usage-based micro-segmenting, behavioral ad targeting and recommendation engines. In-database processing is performed and promoted as a feature by many of the major data warehousing vendors, including Teradata

Teradata

Teradata Corporation is a vendor specializing in data warehousing and analytic applications. Its products are commonly used by companies to manage data warehouses for analytics and business intelligence purposes. Teradata was formerly a division of NCR Corporation, with the spinoff from NCR on...

, Netezza

Netezza

Netezza designs and markets high-performance data warehouse appliances and advanced analytics applications for uses including enterprise data warehousing, business intelligence, predictive analytics and business continuity planning....

, Greenplum

Greenplum

Greenplum is a database software company in San Mateo, California, specializing in enterprise data cloud solutions for large-scale data warehousing and analytics...

 and Aster Data Systems

Aster Data Systems

Aster Data Systems is a data management and analysis software company headquartered in San Carlos, California. It was founded in 2005 and acquired in 2011.-Products:...

.

In-database processing is one of several technologies focused on improving data warehousing performance, including parallel computing

Parallel computing

Parallel computing is a form of computation in which many calculations are carried out simultaneously, operating on the principle that large problems can often be divided into smaller ones, which are then solved concurrently . There are several different forms of parallel computing: bit-level,...

, shared nothing architecture

Shared nothing architecture

A shared nothing architecture is a distributed computing architecture in which each node is independent and self-sufficient, and there is no single point of contention across the system...

s and massive parallel processing. database-embedded calculations respond to growing demand for high-throughput, operational analytics for needs such as fraud detection, credit scoring, and risk management. It is an important step towards improving predictive analytics

Predictive analytics

Predictive analytics encompasses a variety of statistical techniques from modeling, machine learning, data mining and game theory that analyze current and historical facts to make predictions about future events....

capabilities.