Azure Synapse Analytics & Microsoft Fabric Lakehouse Integration

Enterprise business intelligence frequently interfaces with modern data lakes and cloud data warehouses. Azure Synapse Analytics and Microsoft Fabric OneLake combine big data processing, Apache Spark, and dedicated SQL pools into a unified analytical plane.

1. The Lakehouse Pattern & Delta Parquet Tables

In the modern data lakehouse architecture:

• Raw transactional data lands in ADLS Gen2 (Azure Data Lake Storage).
• Data engineers process data using Spark into open-source Delta Lake (Parquet) format.
• Power BI connects to the Lakehouse using two modern protocols:

1. 1
   Serverless SQL Endpoint: Query Delta tables using standard T-SQL on demand.
2. 2
   Direct Lake Mode (Microsoft Fabric): The revolutionary storage mode where VertiPaq reads columnar Delta Parquet files directly from cloud storage with ZERO data duplication and ZERO import latency!

2. Dedicated SQL Pools vs. Serverless SQL

• Dedicated SQL Pools: Massively Parallel Processing (MPP) enterprise data warehouse with provisioned compute (DWUs). Ideal for heavy corporate reporting with strict SLAs.
• Serverless SQL: Pay-per-query model ($5 per TB scanned). Ideal for ad-hoc exploration, data discovery, and lightweight reporting.