Databricks and SAP expand partnership to bring Genie and Lakebase to SAP data

What is being added to SAP Databricks

According to Databricks, the expanded partnership plans to bring the full range of its data and enterprise AI capabilities to SAP Databricks, embedded within SAP Business Data Cloud (SAP BDC). Four products are named:

• Genie: described as an AI coworker that gives every team instant access to governed data and AI, with enterprise context built in. A planned bi-directional integration between Genie and Joule is meant to bring answers and actions into SAP experiences.
• Lakeflow: a unified data engineering solution to ingest, transform and orchestrate data, so teams can build pipelines that combine SAP data with IoT, CRM and third-party sources.
• Unity Gateway: multi-AI governance and cost control across agents, tools, models and MCPs, with guardrails and spend controls.
• Lakebase: described as the first serverless, mission-critical Postgres database built for AI apps and agents, aimed at operational data apps on SAP and enterprise data.

SAP Databricks was introduced last year and natively embeds the Databricks Data + AI Platform in SAP BDC. Databricks says customers including Adidas, Zalando, Mondi and CAF have used it, together with SAP BDC Connect for Databricks, to analyze, govern and build AI on live SAP Data Products through zero-copy, bi-directional OpenSharing.

Reaching SAP application data without custom pipelines

Databricks argues that AI models lack the business context of how a company runs, and that for most enterprises this context sits in SAP systems. The company notes that over 90% of Fortune 500 companies use SAP solutions. Accessing that data has been possible, it says, but typically required custom extraction pipelines that copy data, lose business context and fragment governance.

The announcement centers on SAP Application Data Foundation, which SAP presented at TechEd. It makes data from SAP applications available to the SAP BDC engine of choice, including SAP Databricks, and is described as a cloud-native access route that can lower total cost of ownership and reduce time to value. For SAP Databricks customers, Databricks lists three effects: no more custom extraction pipelines thanks to zero-copy sharing through SAP BDC Connect, AI built on SAP business semantics, and the full Databricks platform available on SAP data.

As an example, Databricks describes a manufacturer running finance and supply chain on SAP ECC on-premises while planning a cloud move. It could bring years of order history into SAP Databricks, enrich it with third-party data and build demand-forecasting models on SAP's business semantics, then keep that work after migrating to the cloud.

Governance, architecture and a customer result

Databricks highlights three points for enterprises. Unity Catalog and Unity Gateway govern data, models and agents across SAP and non-SAP data. Customers can use SAP data inside SAP BDC with SAP Databricks, or bring governed SAP data, or data products built on it, into an existing Databricks estate, with any model on any cloud. And SAP and Databricks are expanding their go-to-market partnership, with joint teams in the field.

The company cites SAF-Holland, a manufacturer of chassis components for trailers, trucks and buses. It uses SAP BDC and SAP Databricks to unify more than 100 million records of customer, delivery and material data, and applies machine learning to predict the reliability of customer delivery schedules. According to Databricks, SAF-Holland now generates analyses 5x faster than with traditional reporting approaches and turns complex SAP data into planning and supply chain insights in minutes instead of weeks.

Philipp Herzig, Chief Technology Officer at SAP SE, said the partnership helps customers turn enterprise data into "a powerful foundation for the Autonomous Enterprise."

Availability and what it means for customers

Databricks states that SAP Databricks and SAP Business Data Cloud Connect for Databricks are available today. For the new SAP Application Data Foundation and the expanded SAP Databricks capabilities, it directs customers to their SAP or Databricks account team. Because the blog describes the Databricks additions as planned, details on timing are not given in the source.

For SAP customers, the pitch is a shorter path from SAP records to analytics and AI agents without building and maintaining copy pipelines, while keeping governance in one place. Whether that holds in practice will depend on how and when the planned capabilities reach SAP Databricks.