"They've hired a bunch of people out of school to a data science department or an R&D department and a modeling department," says Smith, "and they've found that all of them have been trained in R, and not in, say SAS."

And not surprisingly, the most brilliant minds with backgrounds in statistical modelling are in the highest demand, especially since organizations in other sectors, like financial institutions, are scooping them up.

"We provide a consulting arm of Greenplum," says Davis, "which is our data science team, [who] are PhDs that have expertise in a variety of industries and verticals. I have brainiacs, to be honest with you, who are working with customers to enable them to make use of their data."

Jason Kuo, group marketing manager at SAP, says "without a doubt" companies that need to perform complex tasks like predictive analysis are hunting for manpower in the universities. He says SAP's new product, which incorporates a user-friendly interface and drag-and-drop capabilities, will ease the data scientists' transition into the corporate world.