AWS acquires DuckLabs, the company behind DuckDB
DuckLabs, the company behind the open-source analytical database DuckDB and its related projects DuckLake and Quack, announced it will join Amazon Web Services (AWS), with the deal expected to take effect in early September. The roughly 30-person team will stay together in Amsterdam, and DuckDB, DuckLake, Quack and the rest of the open-source "Duck Stack" will remain free under the MIT license, with the nonprofit DuckDB Foundation continuing to steward the projects.
DuckLabs was founded a little over five years ago as a bootstrapped company, fully owned by its founders and development team, deliberately avoiding venture capital even as commercial contracts and VC interest emerged early on. The team grew from a small group to more than 30 people in Amsterdam while continuing to develop DuckDB, which the company says now sees more than one million downloads every day. According to the announcement, the founders came to worry that DuckDB's growth would outpace DuckLabs' ability to support it, and that scaling the company into a much larger sales and operations organization would pull focus away from the technical and open-source work that made DuckDB successful. DuckLabs and AWS had already been working closely together for more than a year before the deal was reached.
Andy Warfield, Distinguished Engineer and Vice President at AWS, is quoted in the announcement praising DuckDB and the DuckLabs team, saying he has worked closely with Mark, Hannes and the rest of the DuckLabs team for about two years. The source does not give last names or titles for Mark or Hannes, nor state that they are DuckLabs' founders.
DuckLabs says what stays the same: the open-source components remain MIT-licensed, the DuckDB Foundation keeps stewardship, and the team remains together in Amsterdam. What is planned to expand: the DuckDB Foundation will add a technical advisory board so community members can weigh in on technical direction, and DuckLabs plans to open the extension stack so that extensions signed by other developers and organizations can run in DuckDB. AWS is described as having committed to supporting DuckDB's continued development and community for the long term. No financial terms, purchase price or valuation of the deal are disclosed in the announcement.
Key facts
- AWS is acquiring DuckLabs, the company behind DuckDB, DuckLake and Quack, in a deal expected to take effect in early September.
- DuckDB, DuckLake, Quack and the rest of the open-source "Duck Stack" remain free under the MIT license, stewarded by the nonprofit DuckDB Foundation.
- DuckLabs was founded a little over five years ago as a bootstrapped, founder-owned company and grew to more than 30 people in Amsterdam; the team stays together there.
- DuckDB now gets more than one million downloads a day; DuckLabs and AWS had already worked closely together for more than a year before the deal.
- Planned changes include a technical advisory board for the DuckDB Foundation and opening the extension stack to third-party signed extensions. No financial terms were disclosed.
Why it matters
DuckDB is a widely used in-process analytical (OLAP) database, and this deal folds one of the more prominent independent open-source data companies into AWS. AWS gets a database with more than a million daily downloads and a technical team it has already partnered with for over a year; DuckLabs gets, in its own telling, the resources to scale support and infrastructure beyond what a roughly 30-person bootstrapped company could manage alone.
Who it affects
DuckDB, DuckLake and Quack users and the vendors and platforms built on top of them; the DuckLabs team, which stays together in Amsterdam; the nonprofit DuckDB Foundation, which keeps stewardship of the open-source projects; and AWS customers, since Andy Warfield's quote specifically notes DuckDB is already used by S3 customers.
How to use it
Nothing changes immediately for existing users: DuckDB, DuckLake, Quack and the other Duck Stack components stay free and MIT-licensed, and no pricing or paid tier is mentioned. Looking ahead, DuckLabs plans to open the extension stack so that extensions signed by developers and organizations outside DuckLabs can run in DuckDB, and the DuckDB Foundation will add a technical advisory board drawing on community input.
How solid is it
The account comes from DuckLabs' own announcement, carried on the company's site, and includes a named, on-record quote from Andy Warfield, AWS's Distinguished Engineer and Vice President. The text does not cite a separate AWS press release or independent confirmation beyond that quote.
Risks and caveats
No purchase price, valuation or other financial terms are disclosed. The announcement does not say whether headcount will change once the deal closes, and it names two DuckLabs figures, Mark and Hannes, only by first name, without titles or confirmation they are the company's founders. Whether AWS's stated long-term commitment to DuckDB's open-source development holds up is not something this announcement can settle on its own.
“DuckDB is an incredible open source project with an amazing community; it is broadly used and very much loved by S3 customers today. After about two years of working closely with Mark, Hannes and the whole team at DuckLabs I'm excited at the opportunity to help the project have an even broader impact.”
— Andy Warfield, Distinguished Engineer and Vice President, AWS