The source is an in-depth investigation from datapro.news, dated September 17, 2025, concerning the fierce competition among Snowflake, Databricks, and Microsoft Cosmos DB to dominate the market for AI-powered data pipelines. The article outlines three distinct philosophical approaches: Snowflake’s "ZeroOps" for democratised, SQL-centric simplicity; Databricks’ "Open Lakehouse AI" for comprehensive machine learning control; and Cosmos DB’s "Operational Excellence" for high-performance, real-time applications within the Azure ecosystem. The analysis assesses each platform's strengths and weaknesses across developer experience, pipeline automation features like Openflow and Lakeflow, and critical challenges such as cost unpredictability and the need for specialised skills. Ultimately, the verdict is that there is no single winner, as the best platform depends entirely on an organisation's specific needs, driving a broader trend towards unified, cohesive data platforms.

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