3 A DATA SCIENCE ECOSYSTEM

The set of technologies used to do data science varies across organizations. The larger the organization or the greater the amount of data being processed or both, the greater the complexity of the technology ecosystem supporting the data science activities. In most cases, this ecosystem contains tools and components from a number of different software suppliers, processing data in many different formats. There is a spectrum of approaches from which an organization can select when developing its own data science ecosystem. At one end of the spectrum, the organization may decide to invest in a commercial integrated tool set. At the other end, it might build up a bespoke ecosystem by integrating a set of open-source tools and languages. In between these two extremes, some software suppliers provide solutions that consist of a mixture of commercial products and open-source products. However, although the particular mix of tools will vary from one organization to the next, there is a commonality in terms of the components that are present in most data science architectures.