Hewlett-Packard Co. hopes to attract more application developers to its data analytics platform with a cloud-based release that makes features previously only available under expensive licenses available for consumption on-demand. The move is unmistakably a jab at IBM, which has been pursuing a similar strategy with Watson (whose freemium application officially launched in beta today).

The enterprise technology stalwart released eight of the artificial intelligence’s core capabilities earlier this year as individual services with the goal of fostering the development of complementary applications, one of the key goals in its billion-dollar monetization plan for the thinking machine. HP is aiming for a similar objective with Haven, which it’s likewise positioning as a platform for third parties to create data-driven services.

Although it may not win any trivia contests in the foreseeable future, the hardware maker’s entry into the world of end-of-end analytics does hold up to Watson where the rubber meets the road in the enterprise. Vertica, the columnar database Haven leverages to handle traditional structured workloads and one of the two components HP is now offering through the cloud, comes with an expansive collection of analytic functions that make it easier for business analysts to ask and answer many of the same questions Watson is currently being used to solve.

But the true equalizer for the company is IDOL, the natural language processing and search it obtained through the $11.7 billion acquisition of Autonomy Corp. PLC in 2011, which reduces the gap between human and machine interaction in a similar fashion to IBM’s cognitive computing platform. The tool provides comparable sentiment and textual meaning analysis capabilities along with features that the cloud-based version of Watson does not yet support, such as facial recognition.

Making the individual components of Haven more accessible helps increase the appeal of the overall package, which is greater than the sum of its parts thanks to extensive integration under the hood. And HP is doubling down on that aspect of its value proposition as well with the release of a new solution that combines the platform with three of its core data management tools to help organizations track information as it moves across different systems.

The hardware maker is also rolling out an infrastructure automation suite that utilizes Haven to scan sensory information from servers and other devices on the network for information on discrepancies between service levels and user requirements. Besides features for monitoring and optimizing hardware operations, the bundle also includes a cloud-based help desk tool meant to help customer care representatives address complaints more effectively.