Redis 8.0 Launches with Enhanced AI Capabilities and Data Integration Features

Redis debuts new data integration and AI features for its database - SiliconANGLE

Redis debuts new data integration and AI features for its database Redis Inc. today updated its namesake database with a set of new features designed to ease software development for customers. Some of the enhancements are rolling out for the core open-source version of the platform. Others will become available in the paid version, which includes additional features that simplify infrastructure maintenance and data processing tasks. Many enterprise applications keep their information in two separate programs: a primary database and a second, faster database known as the cache. The cache holds the most frequently accessed records. Workloads can retrieve those records from the cache faster than they could from the primary database, which improves application performance. Redis' namesake platform is one of the most popular open-source caches on the market. The company sells a paid version, Redis Enterprise, that includes reliability and scalability improvements. There's also a managed edition called Redis Cloud that removes the need for users to manage the underlying infrastructure. The first enhancement the company debuted today is in preview on Redis Cloud and generally available for Redis Enterprise users. It's a tool called Redis Data Integration, or RDI for short. Customers can use it to move the contents of external databases into Redis for caching. Streaming records into the platform historically required developers to build custom data transfer workflows. RDI removes that requirement. The tool automatically copies records from external databases to Redis and regularly syncs changes that users make to the original files. "RDI provides the connection through a single API, so you can simplify development, and make your data more reliable," Redis Chief Executive Officer Rowan Trollope wrote in a blog post. RDI is rolling out alongside another new feature dubbed Redis Copilot. It's an artificial intelligence assistant that users can ask for pointers on how to use the database. The chatbot provides clarification about Redis settings, generates queries based on natural language prompts and performs related tasks. Redis Copilot is now generally available in Redis Insight, a desktop-based database management tool that the company ships with its paid products. The tool provides a visual interface for configuring database settings and updating records. Customers can also interact with their Redis deployments through a new plug-in for Visual Studio Code, Microsoft Corp.'s popular code editor, that likewise rolled out as part of today's update. The feature additions are to be followed by a major upgrade to the open-source version of Redis in the fall. Redis 8, as the upcoming release will be called, is set to bring over several features from the paid Redis Enterprise edition. Free users will receive access to support for JSON records and probabilistic data structures. JSON is a ubiquitous file format that many applications use to store their information. Redis' probabilistic data structures, in turn, make it easier to store statistical information such as how likely it is that a website visitor will turn into a paying customer.

Redis 8 Launches with AI Capabilities, Expands Developer Access

Alongside Redis 8, the company unveiled Redis for AI, a new package designed to support the modern AI stack, and several other products aimed at enhancing developer workflows. Redis has introduced Redis 8, a major update to its data platform, offering advanced features to its community of developers. Alongside Redis 8, the company unveiled Redis for AI, a new package designed to support the modern AI stack, and several other products aimed at enhancing developer workflows. Redis 8 brings advanced features, previously available only in Redis Stack, to the Redis Community Edition. This update includes support for JSON, search, and vector databases, making it easier for developers to scale mobile, web, and AI applications. Redis 8 Community Edition is now available for general use. Redis for AI is a comprehensive package designed to accelerate the deployment of GenAI applications. The package includes new products like RedisVL 0.3.0 and partner integrations such as langchain-redis and llama-index-vector-stores-redis. It aims to address challenges related to data speed, security, and integrity in AI development. The company also introduced Redis Flex, an update to Redis on Flash, which reduces the cost of Redis deployments by up to 80% while maintaining performance. Redis Flex will be available for public preview soon. Additionally, Redis Copilot, a virtual assistant integrated into Redis Insight, is now available, offering developers faster access to documentation and automated code generation. Finally, Redis Data Integration (RDI) was launched to help customers synchronise data between existing databases and Redis with minimal setup, enabling a federated data stack. RDI is currently available on Redis Software, with plans to expand to Redis Cloud. These announcements were made during Redis Released: Bengaluru, with additional events scheduled in Singapore, London, and New York City later this year.India boasts a staggering Redis user base of approximately 12 million downloads per day, securing its position as the third-largest adopter on the planet, closely trailing behind the technology giants, the United States and China.

After changing its license, Redis drops its biggest release yet | TechCrunch

Redis, the company behind the popular in-memory data store, which is often used as a cache, vector database or streaming engine, today announced the launch of Redis 8. With this release, the company is doubling down on Redis as a vector database for AI use cases and launching an AI Copilot the help developers more quickly retrieve Redis docs and write code. The company is also adding a new integration service, making it easier for developers to get data into Redis without using a third-party service, and it is putting its Speedb acquisition to good use with the launch of Redis Flex. Redis CEO Rowan Trollope described this release as the company's biggest release yet. If you've followed along, you'll remember that Redis announced some licensing changes earlier this year. It went from the open-source BSD to a dual-license scheme, using the Redis Source Available License (RSALv2) and Server Side Public License (SSPLv1). The main goal of this switch is essentially the same as that of every other open-source company that recently changed its license: prevent the large cloud providers from offering hosted services based on these open-source projects. They can, of course, buy a license (and Microsoft has done so). What's interesting here is that Trollope argued that before changing the license, Redis was essentially self-censoring. "The license was really holding back a lot of the innovation from the company," he said. "You know, we had this problem where anything we put into the open source would be taken for free by Google and Amazon and then sold -- given away, essentially -- to their customers with their superior monopolistic advantages. So the change of the license has really been like breaking down the dam. And what was behind the dam is this huge reservoir of innovation that the company had been building up." Trollope called Redis 8 a total revamp of Redis and the company's "blockbuster summer release." With this release, he said, the company is leaning into the project's reason for being: speed. But at the same time, he said, Redis has also seen growing traction with generative AI developers who are looking for speedy vector databases to innovate on top of foundation models with retrieval-augmented generation (RAG), for example. But what's maybe even more interesting is that many developers now use Redis to speed up (and save on) their inferencing for prompt and semantic caching -- which also brings Redis back full-circle to its roots as the popular caching tool it was already. Redis is seeing developers save between 30% and 90% on their inferencing cost with this. "We've really been following the developers and trying to help make the experience of using our product better by doing things like integrating our tech into various stacks, various frameworks like LangChain, OpenAI and Llama, etc., to make sure they have a great experience," Trollope said. One thing the licensing change also allowed for was bringing features that were previously in Redis Stack directly into the Redis 8 Community Edition. Because it was BSD licensed, Redis couldn't put these features in Redis Core before. Now, there is no distinction between Redis Core and Redis Stack anymore. It's the Redis Community edition instead. In addition to these marquee AI features, the company is also announcing Redis Flex, for those who want to run Redis caches on flash drives instead of in-memory. The company already offered Redis on Flash and Redis Flex is essentially the next-gen version of this, based on the company's acquisition of Speedb earlier this year. Flex can run on DRAM and SSDs, making it significantly cheaper to run than the traditional version of Redis, which has always been an in-memory database and hence relied on more expensive memory. Redis argues that with Flex, businesses will be able to bring their cost for caching data down by 80%. This feature will launch into public preview soon. It's also no secret that Redis is still looking ahead to an IPO. As Trollope told TechCrunch exclusively, the company recently hired a new CFO, Tony Tiscornia, formerly the CFO of Coupa, and a new Chief Administrative Officer, Diane Honda, who joined from Barracuda Networks. "When the markets are conducive to more IPOs, we're financially ready for that. It's really more about the markets," Trollope said -- and if there's one thing I've learned about pre-IPO startups, it's that when they hire new CFO's, and especially ones that oversaw previous IPOs like Tiscornia did at Coupa in 2016, they are most definitely inching toward an IPO.