Why Ascend?
Ascend is the Agentic Data Engineering platform that unifies data ingestion, transformation, orchestration, and observability into a single intelligent system. Organizations choose Ascend to replace dozens of complicated data tools with one unified platform where teams can build, deploy, and manage their data pipelines with unprecedented ease. As productivity software for data engineering, Ascend delivers dramatic improvements in both team productivity and cost efficiency by freeing your team from fixing broken connections between disparate systems, enabling them to focus on leveraging data to drive business growth.
Unified data and analytics engineering
Data engineering shouldn't be a battle against tool sprawl and integration nightmares. Ascend transforms data engineering into what it should be: unified, intelligent, and autonomous. Here's how we're revolutionizing the field with two breakthrough innovations: complete platform unification and Agentic Data Engineering.
The modern data stack is broken
Every year, FirstMark's MAD landscape report reveals a staggering reality: enterprises are drowning in complexity, requiring many tools just to meet their basic data platform needs. This is the opposite of progress.
The hidden cost of complexity
Tool sprawl complicates your architecture and steals your team's potential. Data engineers spend countless hours wrestling with integrations and chasing errors across disconnected systems instead of building the transformative solutions your business needs.
Worse yet, every additional tool creates another barrier to AI adoption. When your data infrastructure resembles a house of cards, building intelligent workflows becomes nearly impossible.
One platform, infinite possibilities
Ascend eliminates the chaos with radical simplification: ingest, transform, load, and orchestration, unified in a single platform. This unification is powered by a fundamentally different approach to data engineering. Unlike traditional ETL tools that require you to specify every processing step, Ascend uses a primarily declarative approach—you simply specify what your data should look like, and the platform intelligently determines the most efficient processing path. When imperative control is needed for specific configurations, that flexibility remains available.
When the complexity of tool integration disappears and intelligent automation handles the "how," data engineers can focus on what they do best: creating value that transforms your business. This unification enables something impossible in fragmented architectures: an AI layer with complete end-to-end observability across your entire data ecosystem.
Agentic data engineering
At the heart of Ascend's AI capabilities lies the Intelligence Core, which provides AI agents with unprecedented access to your entire data universe. This comprehensive context includes live data, metadata, Git history, and complete pipeline run history, enabling truly autonomous workflows that were previously impossible.
This foundation combines seamlessly with Ascend's architecture, which provides the ideal platform for AI agents to operate safely at scale. Built on DataOps best practices, engineers and AI agents collaborate within Workspaces that are version controlled, Git-backed, and connected to Projects. After code review, teams merge changes into Deployments where Automations orchestrate data pipelines and workflows.
Together, these capabilities unlock unprecedented agentic potential. Our AI agent, Otto, operates with complete visibility into your production environment while maintaining strict safety boundaries, transforming how data engineering teams work.
Picture this: a pipeline fails at 2 AM. By the time you check your phone in the morning, an agent has already diagnosed the root cause, assessed downstream impact, and prepared a fix. See these autonomous workflows in action in our webinar.
Outcomes
When data engineering teams adopt Ascend, the transformation is measurable and immediate. Our customers achieve a 7x productivity boost by eliminating time spent on tool integration and maintenance. Data processing accelerates by 87% through intelligent optimization and autonomous pipeline management, while costs drop by 83% as unified architecture maximizes resource efficiency.
These aren't just metrics—they represent real teams shipping faster, solving bigger problems, and driving meaningful business impact. Discover how industry leaders like Harry's and Biome transformed their data operations with Ascend's unified platform.
Who is Ascend for?
Ascend for organizations
Ascend serves organizations across diverse industries including media, healthcare, and technology. Whether you're a startup with a single data engineer or an enterprise with hundreds of team members, Ascend scales to meet your needs. Small teams benefit from the unified platform's simplicity and reduced infrastructure overhead, while large organizations leverage DataOps features like multi-environment Deployments and end-to-end observability.
Ascend across data roles
Data engineers can use Ascend to:
- Build and orchestrate complex data pipelines with automated dependency management and intelligent scheduling.
- Leverage agentic workflows with Otto for autonomous pipeline monitoring, error diagnosis, and remediation.
- Implement DataOps best practices with Git-backed workspaces, automated testing, and Automations in Deployments.
Analytics engineers can use Ascend to:
- Create sophisticated data models using familiar SQL with advanced features like Smart Transforms and incremental processing.
- Build reliable data transformations with built-in testing, schema evolution handling, and data quality validation.
- Collaborate seamlessly with data engineers through shared Git workflows and unified lineage tracking.
Data architects can use Ascend to:
- Design and govern enterprise data architectures with comprehensive lineage tracking and metadata management across all pipelines.
- Establish data governance frameworks through unified observability and automated data quality monitoring.
- Make strategic data platform decisions with confidence through Ascend's unified architecture and comprehensive data lifecycle visibility.
Data scientists and analysts benefit from Ascend's unified platform through complete visibility into data lineage and pipeline runs, enabling them to understand data provenance and trust their analyses. The platform's comprehensive metadata layer offers rich context for exploratory analysis and model development.
Ecosystem
Ascend integrates seamlessly with your existing data infrastructure while continuously expanding its ecosystem of supported technologies. The platform evolves alongside the data engineering landscape, ensuring you can leverage the latest tools and formats.
Ascend works with the following data platforms:
Ascend natively connects to the following data sources and allows for custom ingestion:
Databases:
Object stores:
Community
Join our community Slack and explore our community GitHub repository to learn more about Ascend.
Ready to transform your data engineering?
This is just the beginning of what's possible when unification meets intelligence. Connect with our team to discover how Ascend can make data engineering delightful for your team today.
Next steps
- 🚀 Getting started: Explore our quickstart guides and build your first data pipeline
- 👩🏻💻 Free trial: Try Ascend on the Developer plan
- 💻 Free trial - Start your free trial of the Ascend platform today
- 💡 How-to guides: Step-by-step instructions for common tasks