Aware propels platform performance, customer experiences with Azure Cosmos DB

The way in which we work, communicate, and collaborate has changed drastically over the past several years. No one knows this more than Aware. Aware has become an industry leader in collaboration intelligence technology because it understands that for companies to truly support their employees, they need a clear-eyed sense of how their workers feel.                                                        

Aware interoperates with leading collaboration tools like Microsoft Teams, Zoom, Slack, and Cisco Webex to aggregate and analyze employee sentiment. The company’s platform ingests data, passes it through Aware’s proprietary machine learning model for sensitivity and security analysis, and provides customers with the information they need to make data-driven, proactive decisions. For the platform to handle the vast amounts of largely unstructured data it needs to ingest, it required a serious cloud database solution. The company found exactly that with Azure Cosmos DB.

The pulse of the digital workplace

Aware gives businesses the ability to stay abreast of employee sentiment. Its machine learning models are among the most accurate prediction models on the market, and because its platform can normalize all conversations into a common format for analysis, it can work with almost any collaboration tool. Says Debasish Biswas, Chief Technology Officer at Aware, “Hybrid work is here to stay, and that work is getting done on collaboration tools, not email. Our enterprise customers are realizing they can’t run their businesses unless they have their finger on the pulse of the digital workplace—that’s what we provide.”

The Aware platform ingests collaboration tool data through APIs and runs that data through its intelligent data fabric for normalization and analysis. The company had traditionally used Azure Database for PostgreSQL to handle its back-end data requirements, but that was designed for more structured data than Aware typically ingests. Both the sheer volume and unstructured nature of the company’s data were mismatched to the capabilities of Azure Database for PostgreSQL, which frequently resulted in challenges. Biswas recalls, “The way we were handling unstructured data was generating issues for us and caused incidents that our team had to quickly react to.”

A more efficient processing path

In search of a better approach, Aware moved some of its blobs to Azure Cosmos DB, and the company’s data path became much more efficient and cost-effective. Aware takes advantage of the strengths of both Azure Cosmos DB and Azure Database for PostgreSQL to enhance the performance of its platform. With its new architecture, Aware routes highly structured data into Azure Database for PostgreSQL in a more efficient and simplified manner, and it uses Azure Cosmos DB to handle the rest of its unstructured data requirements. Says Biswas, “With Azure Cosmos DB, we can conduct more of our advanced processing and take some of the heavy-duty items out of Azure Database for PostgreSQL to improve the overall efficiency of our pipeline. We get the best of both worlds.”

The company uses the rapid-indexing capabilities of Azure Cosmos DB to process unstructured data quickly and easily. Aware now uses both Azure Cosmos DB and Azure Database for PostgreSQL to split the processing of ingested data into two parallel processing streams, where structured data flows through Azure Database for PostgreSQL, while Azure Cosmos DB handles unstructured data. By combining both solutions, Aware can divide and conquer for faster and better results.

After deciding to move some data streams to Azure Cosmos DB, Aware received additional guidance and assistance from the Azure engineering team for implementing its new solution. “The transition has been seamless, and Azure Cosmos DB is delivering better results than we expected, which is fantastic,” says Biswas. “It makes sense to use Azure Cosmos DB for blobs of unstructured data because it can handle that data so efficiently.”

Better performance at lower costs

Although it’s still early in Aware’s pivot to Azure Cosmos DB, the results are conclusive. “Azure Cosmos DB gives us attractive return on investment” states Biswas. “Since onboarding Azure Cosmos DB, we haven’t had to spend our time reacting to unexpected issues, and that helps our team focus on the larger goal.” With a more resilient and reliable platform, Aware employees spend less time reacting to problems and more time being proactive, innovating and enhancing the company’s platform.

More consistent performance is also yielding better downstream results. Since Aware restructured how its platform ingests data, the customer experience has improved immensely, with users receiving faster, richer query returns. And because the company’s new architecture has increased the platform’s stability and performance, the customer experience is more predictable. “With the consistency we’re seeing in Azure Cosmos DB and Azure Database for PostgreSQL, our customers now have a much better idea about what to expect in terms of queries and reports,” says Biswas.

With its Azure Cosmos DB and Azure Database for PostgreSQL solution, Aware can do more with less and can deliver better results with less effort. “We’re only a quarter of the way into our transition to Azure Cosmos DB, and we’re already seeing performance improvements,” says Biswas. The performance of the company’s platform has jumped tremendously since Aware brought Azure Cosmos DB onboard.

Because the platform now delivers best-in-class customer experiences and works reliably, the investment is worthwhile, concludes Biswas. “It works as advertised, which might seem basic, but things often don’t,” he says. “Azure Cosmos DB far exceeded our expectations. We made a smooth transition, it solved our performance challenges, and guess what? It also brought down our Azure Database for PostgreSQL costs.”

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