Airtable Inc., creator of a no-code platform for building applications and workflows, is expanding on its investments in artificial intelligence with the launch of new tools that will enable every organization to start taking advantage of AI.
The new products announced today include App Library, a new tool for deploying custom-developed applications that integrate AI models, and HyperDB, which paves the way for companies to create workflows that integrate massive datasets from platforms like Databricks and Snowflake.
Airtable sells a cloud-based “Digital Operations Platform” that enables teams to store, organize and collaborate on structured data. It works as a real-time database and has often been referred to as “spreadsheets on steroids”. It’s known for its user-friendly interface, which makes it possible for anyone to spin up a database in just a few minutes, and store, organize and collaborate on information about anything — including employee directories, product inventories, marketing campaigns and so on, without any knowledge of Structured Query Language. Indeed, they don’t even need to know what SQL stands for.
The company first began probing what generative AI can do with the launch of its Airtable AI tools last year. At the time of its launch, the company said the idea was to make it simple for companies to integrate generative AI into the no-code applications and business workflows created using its platform, without any technical skills.
In an interview with VentureBeat, Airtable co-founder and Chief Executive Howie Liu said the new capabilities launched today build on that release, and are designed to make the underlying large language models that power generative AI more accessible to everyday workers.
“There’s been way too much emphasis on just the hard tech, and not nearly enough emphasis on the ergonomics and how to actually utilize LLMs today,” he said.
With its new tools, Airtable says it’s trying to get the balance right between standardization and customization of applications. To that end, App Library provides a simple framework for building standardized business apps with embedded AI capabilities that can then be customized by different business teams.
Liu likened the App Library to a “Lego kit” and said it’s all about making LLM technology more accessible to citizen developers.
As for HyperDB, this makes it easy for users to create customized AI apps and workflows that can tap into Databricks and Snowflake data. “All the while, administrators maintain governance of the data and ensure compliance to industry standards,” the company said in a blog post. “With HyperDB, it’s possible to pull 100M+ records into Airtable, and operationalize that data across the organization. The result? Stronger decision making fueled by critical, cross-functional information.”
Additional capabilities announced today include “Org Branding”, which allows users to customize Airtable with their own branding and logos, and “App Sandbox”, for creating, testing and customizing no-code applications in a safe environment prior to deployment.
The company said one of its customers, described as a “leading streaming company”, has already used its new tools to create an application for automatica content genre classification. According to Airtable, that company has saved its teams around 280 hours per week.
The focus on AI and application building accelerates Airtable’s shift from its origins as a simple, collaborative spreadsheet tool. As its offerings become more powerful, it’s increasingly going up against competing tools offered by big enterprises such as Microsoft Corp., Salesforce Inc. and ServiceNow Inc., which offer similar capabilities for creating applications and workflows that integrate with AI.
To succeed, the company will need to ensure that its innovations provide the kind of productivity gains it claims without causing headaches for employees. And it will have to do this in a way that’s more cost-effective than its rivals.