The DAIS 2026 Speaker Spotlight is a series where we hand the mic to the speakers heading to Data + AI Summit and let them answer a few short questions, in their own voice, no press-release polish.
Below, Anand Rao on how he built the Lakewatch cyberanalytics app from the ground up, why security belongs on the lakehouse, and the Monday-morning blueprint he wants teams to leave with. Lightly edited for length, otherwise the words are his.
“
A clear path to something your team fully owns, built for your data, your scale, your use cases.
— Anand Rao
The topic
What is your talk about, and who is it for?
This talk is for cybersecurity and data teams ready to take ownership. We'll show you how to build a custom cyberanalytics app on Lakewatch, which sits on the Lakehouse and the Lakebase, making it faster, more flexible, and built exactly the way your team needs it.
The personal stake
Why are you the person giving this talk?
Surya and I are Databricks Application Specialists focused on Data and AI architecture, and I am one of the company's SMEs for Lakewatch and cybersecurity. I built the cyberanalytics app myself from the ground up, every layer, every decision. This session is us sharing everything we learned so you can move faster and build something you're proud of.
What you'll leave with
What will someone be able to do on Monday morning that they couldn't do before?
You'll walk out with a real blueprint for building a cyberanalytics app on Lakehouse and Lakebase. Monday morning, you can start mapping your architecture, understand exactly where Lakebase fits in the real-time detection layer, and have a clear path to something your team fully owns, built for your data, your scale, your use cases.
The bigger picture
How does this fit into where Databricks, and data and AI more broadly, is heading?
Databricks is building toward a world where one unified platform powers every analytical workload, and security is a first-class part of that vision. Lakebase is a meaningful step in that direction. What we're showing here is what modern security operations look like when they're built on open, flexible, lakehouse-native infrastructure.
Part of the DAIS 2026 Speaker Spotlight series, more voices dropping in the weeks ahead. Got a DAIS speaker you'd love to hear from next? Mention them in the comments, we're always listening.
