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Thoughts on possible implications for users in foreseeable future? We built a lot using dbt and can't really think of going back or switching to alternatives

Kiro 1y ago
What's the lock-in?
- globular-toast 1y ago
  I'm wondering too. We run dbt on-prem. Worst that could happen is we don't get any more free updates. But we have the software and it will continue to run.
  - hn1986 1y ago
    the concern is that dbt-core will become stagnant.
    - mjirv 1y ago
      It basically already has since they started developing dbt Fusion, so in that respect this probably doesn’t change much. I expect they’ll keep developing Fusion but possibly as even more of a commercial-only offering than it already was.
    - globular-toast 1y ago
      What's the problem specifically? Are you banking on some future features? Can't fix the bugs yourself? Worried it won't be compatible with future data warehouses? I know people don't like it these days, but you can just continue to run old software.
      - vovavili 1y ago
        dbt in particular is effectively useless without maintained and up-to-date connectors to your particular database.
        globular-toast 1y ago
        Do your database vendors often do breaking changes to their protocols? dbt just generates SQL and that's not going anywhere.
- 0cf8612b2e1e 1y ago
  The cloud component is probably sticky if you have come to rely on those parts.
bootsmann 1y ago
Are you using their cloud offering or just the software itself?
- pawelduda 1y ago
  Just the software
rockostrich 1y ago
Fivetran isn't really much of a transformation layer so this is likely just a move to lock-in customers of both companies by upselling an ingestion/transformation layer to existing customers. The bigger question mark to me is that Fivetran recently acquired Tobiko, the company behind a dbt competitor SQLMesh. The Tobiko team said their focus has been on dbt-compatibility because a lot of Fivetran customers use dbt for their transformation layer. I fear it may have just been a way to get rid of competition leading up to this deal. I can't imagine Fivetran spent a ton of money just to have 2 products that do very similar things. We use both open-source SQLMesh as well as their cloud offering Tobiko Cloud. Following the acquisition, we were annoyed that focus was going to go to dbt compatibility because there was a bunch of stuff on their roadmap that would help us that was now deprioritized. Thankfully, they still offer great support to us and delivered a few features that have given us some quality of life improvements. With this announcement, I'm worried we're going to end up being forced to migrate to dbt...
hisnameisjimmy 1y ago
Full disclosure: I am a PM at Fivetran who is very excited about this. We are fully committed to open source dbt and don't want to build a 'walled garden'. Interoperability is one of the key value propositions of both Fivetran and dbt. While I'm biased, I think the main implications for users is that their favorite tooling will be with one vendor who cares about what makes them great. You can read a bit more here: https://www.fivetran.com/blog/the-era-of-open-data-infrastructure https://www.fivetran.com/blog/the-era-of-open-data-infrastru...
- pawelduda 1y ago
  Thanks!

Kiro 1y ago

What's the lock-in?

globular-toast 1y ago
I'm wondering too. We run dbt on-prem. Worst that could happen is we don't get any more free updates. But we have the software and it will continue to run.
- hn1986 1y ago
  the concern is that dbt-core will become stagnant.
  - mjirv 1y ago
    It basically already has since they started developing dbt Fusion, so in that respect this probably doesn’t change much. I expect they’ll keep developing Fusion but possibly as even more of a commercial-only offering than it already was.
  - globular-toast 1y ago
    What's the problem specifically? Are you banking on some future features? Can't fix the bugs yourself? Worried it won't be compatible with future data warehouses? I know people don't like it these days, but you can just continue to run old software.
    - vovavili 1y ago
      dbt in particular is effectively useless without maintained and up-to-date connectors to your particular database.
      - globular-toast 1y ago
        Do your database vendors often do breaking changes to their protocols? dbt just generates SQL and that's not going anywhere.
0cf8612b2e1e 1y ago
The cloud component is probably sticky if you have come to rely on those parts.

bootsmann 1y ago

Are you using their cloud offering or just the software itself?

pawelduda 1y ago
Just the software

rockostrich 1y ago

Fivetran isn't really much of a transformation layer so this is likely just a move to lock-in customers of both companies by upselling an ingestion/transformation layer to existing customers. The bigger question mark to me is that Fivetran recently acquired Tobiko, the company behind a dbt competitor SQLMesh. The Tobiko team said their focus has been on dbt-compatibility because a lot of Fivetran customers use dbt for their transformation layer. I fear it may have just been a way to get rid of competition leading up to this deal. I can't imagine Fivetran spent a ton of money just to have 2 products that do very similar things. We use both open-source SQLMesh as well as their cloud offering Tobiko Cloud. Following the acquisition, we were annoyed that focus was going to go to dbt compatibility because there was a bunch of stuff on their roadmap that would help us that was now deprioritized. Thankfully, they still offer great support to us and delivered a few features that have given us some quality of life improvements. With this announcement, I'm worried we're going to end up being forced to migrate to dbt...

hisnameisjimmy 1y ago

Full disclosure: I am a PM at Fivetran who is very excited about this. We are fully committed to open source dbt and don't want to build a 'walled garden'. Interoperability is one of the key value propositions of both Fivetran and dbt. While I'm biased, I think the main implications for users is that their favorite tooling will be with one vendor who cares about what makes them great. You can read a bit more here: https://www.fivetran.com/blog/the-era-of-open-data-infrastructure https://www.fivetran.com/blog/the-era-of-open-data-infrastru...

pawelduda 1y ago
Thanks!