text: **8.3 Configuring a multicloud data lake**
  
  This section introduces the concept of a data lake and how it fits in a multicloud environment. 
  
  **8.3.1 Data lake overview**
  
  A data lake is a next-generation hybrid data management solution that is designed to meet 
  the challenge and need to deal with big data in a hybrid multicloud environment. It is not a 
  product; rather, it is a hybrid data management reference architecture that is designed to form 
  part of your data governance strategy. 
  
  The use of a data lake offers greater flexibility than a data warehouse. A data lake 
  consolidates an organization’s data into a governed and well-managed environment that 
  supports production workloads and analytics development. 
  
  The use of a data lake includes the following benefits: 
  
  (cid:2) Storing data in its native format means less time spent on data preparation 
  (cid:2) Simplified data access 
  (cid:2) Enhanced agility for applications data users 
  (cid:2) Improved decision-making 
  (cid:2) Reduced costs 
  
  For more information about data lakes and their benefits, see the following resources: 
  
  (cid:2) What is a Data Lake? 
  (cid:2) Build a better data lake 
  
  The following data lake providers operate in a multicloud environment: 
  
  (cid:2) IBM (through a partnership with Cloudera) 
  (cid:2) Google 
  (cid:2) Amazon AWS 
  (cid:2) Microsoft Azure 
  (cid:2) Hadoop 
  (cid:2) Terradata 
  (cid:2) Hortonworks 