Informatica Intelligent Data Management Cloud (IDMC) Reviews

It improves the workflow.

In terms of the user experience, it's very Integrated, and the implementation is very fast. You can integrate the platforms for different services to deliver all the banking needs.

It is expensive.

I have been using Informatica Cloud Data Integration for two years.

I rate the solution’s stability a ten out of ten.

The scalability is impressive. Implementing something is easy, and there's no need to wait for licenses or other potential roadblocks. It is a highly efficient and smooth process, which makes it even more appealing.

The main reason for the switch was the cost. IBM solutions are quite expensive, and migrating to the cloud platform is complicated. Another significant expense comes from the database, as IBM typically recommends DB2 when implementing DataStage, and using Db2 can be costly. The company considered moving to a more versatile platform that supports different databases and cloud providers. With IBM, there are limitations, and the cloud strategy is more rigid, which influenced the decision to explore other platforms.

Deployment is straightforward. I have experience implementing the platform for various customers here in Brazil, where I live, and I can confirm that it's quite easy to implement. It takes around six months to deploy.

Data has been migrated from IBM DataStage to Informatica Cloud. In this process, we worked with NextPath MSA, which generated new metadata based on the iDMC platform. After this, the company produced the data, and here at the bank, we are validating the conversion from this process. In some cases, adjustments or parameterization were needed with Informatica to refine the processes. The company is responsible for translating the code and generating the required information for each project. We migrate this to the development environment, then to the test environment for validation, and finally to production, where about sixty percent of the projects are implemented for data integration. The entire process, from creation to production, has taken approximately six months.

We are reviewing all components and executions, and overall, the migration process has been a success, with only minor adjustments. It’s interesting to see how the company has successfully converted the original metadata to the new metadata, showcasing its expertise in the process. We have 40-50 professionals involved.  We have different levels of specialists across various areas involved in this project. For example, we have experts with extensive knowledge of IBM DataStage, others with experience in IBM CA, and some professionals specializing in databases. Each group brings expertise and experience with these solutions, contributing significantly to the project's success.

They do have additional costs in terms of usage.

The bank acquired the platform and utilized almost all its services except MDM. We use APIs, messaging, data governance, and data integration for the enterprise. The platform's full range of services is involved. The combination of data integration with application integration is precious to us. It allows us to acquire information through APIs, treat this information via data integration, and generate files or intermediary databases for future consumption by messaging systems. This type of usage is efficient and straightforward to implement. The implementation and usage are simple and effective for our needs.

In our daily operations, we receive data from external and internal systems for Kuzena and generate information in real-time for various departments within the bank, such as the risk and human resources departments. The platform’s ability to efficiently deliver this information is precious.

When a platform provides data from external systems and other sources, combined with HEP implementation and fast integration, the platform ensures high data quality and the ability to deliver information efficiently. This simplicity allows all departments in the bank to adopt and explore this type of usage easily.

I know of other companies using Informatica Cloud, like Ferrero in Chicago. They used Informatica Cloud for three years but migrated to SAP CPI this year. While I know why they made the switch, it's hard to justify it fully. For context, Ferrara produces candies and is owned by Ferrero Rocher in Italy. The IT team in Italy used SAP CPI for data integration, closing their operations with Informatica products. It's surprising, especially because Ferrero had given us positive feedback about Informatica Cloud regarding usage, implementation, and cost.

Its open platform allows it to connect with everything you need, making it very versatile and efficient for various integrations.

Overall, I rate the solution a ten out of ten.

So my use case was on migration.  I've been using these products for migration activities. And providing any QA solution for the integration to other platforms like Databricks.

There are newer technologies in the market that offer better solutions compared to traditional ETL operations. For example, if we use Spark on Databricks, it's more optimized and runs much faster due to its backend capabilities. Whereas Informatica Inc.'s Cloud Services provide cloud-based solutions. The ETL works on the Informatica engine, which is comparatively slow. But the compatibility of data and other integration and data warehouse works well for IICS.

The interface is really good. Another valuable feature is that it is user-friendly.

There are a few improvements which can be done. So those are on data governance and making an image of each object that is being created on top of Informatica, I mean, on top of applications. So those need areas to be improved.

The logging methods are really traditional. So logging, in order to track any operations happening on this interface, will catch a log file. That needs to be more precise.

In future releases as well, I would like to see additional features. So there is no platform where code conversion can happen easily. For example, if you want to move Informatica jobs in various areas, it's quite easy and straightforward. But still, you require some manual intervention for code changes that need to be done throughout the platform. So these things need to be improved. 

And other things are the compatibility of other services. For example, if you have a running Spark code and you want to run the Spark code into Informatica IICS, which is not compatible, so you need to rewrite the whole syntax to make it compatible. So those are the areas that really need improvement.

I have been using Informatica for three years. We currently use the version Informatica Cloud IICS.

Stability is good. I would rate it a seven out of ten. 

Scalability is good since from on-prem to cloud, there's a huge performance boost. So on a scale from one to ten, I would rate it eight.

The setup is complex. Because it's not about the data; it's about the complexity of the pipeline, the complexity of models which have been designed for data engineering. And it's not something straightforward, and the migration cost goes higher on this aspect for this reason.

We have multiple platforms with it. Some of them are running on-prem, and some of them are running on the cloud.

There is definitely an ROI because many companies are preferring to put data in the cloud, and they want to reduce the migration cost. So without any major efforts or challenges in the migration activities, if that's the case, then moving from Informatica on-prem to IICS is a better choice.

Comparatively, other services are providing a lower price, but since moving from Informatica on-prem to IICS, the pricing factor is much better. So when we compare two platforms of the same vendor, it's a good price.

On the evaluation, I have personally evaluated the migration work that I have done. So it is really easy for Informatica users who have been using the same on-prem product. For them, there won't be any challenges in learning any technical aspects of the cloud. So it is almost straightforward. And there are good services provided by Informatica, like integrated things and driver compatibility. So, everything looks much better when it is in the cloud.

Overall, I would rate the solution an eight out of ten.

We essentially use Informatica Axon to set up a data governance framework for a corporation, usually a medium-sized or large organization.

The dictionary, the search, and the ratings are without a doubt the most beneficial components of this solution. 

Socializing data governance is one of the examples, but I'm not sure what the others were. For instance, if you locate a specific data attribute, you can grade its accuracy by assigning it a star rating between 0 and 5. 

When someone else conducts a search, they might discover whether employees at the company believe the data to be of high quality.

In terms of additional features, I believe it is quite rich. As I previously stated, it is a fairly mature product.

The main issue probably has nothing to do with end users, but installation can definitely be simplified. Also, I believe that this is something that they are already working on it, but it needs to be provided as a service. 

The Microsoft version, Purview, is now available as a cloud service, it must be provided as a service rather than just installation. You do not need to go through the installation, you literally create an account in five minutes. That is something they need to do. I believe that it is already something they are on working on, but I don't believe it has yet been released.

Over the past year, I have definitely used Informatica Axon.

I have worked with Informatica Axon for two years.

We are always working with the latest version.

Informatica Axon is a stable product.

It's a fairly mature product. For many years, it has been the market leader.

Informatica Axon is a scalable solution.

The smallest organization would have 500 users.

Any of the multinational corporations could be the largest. It's quite pricey. 

It is commonly used by large multinational corporations.

It has two or three user interfaces, one for everyone in the organization, one for specific data analysts, and one for IT technical staff.

Like many organizations, technical support responds quickly at times. It can take some time. It's about average, in my opinion. I wouldn't say it's particularly good or bad. It's average.

I would rate the technical support a three and a half out of five.

Neutral

I am just really familiar with Azure DevOps as a deployment technology.

Some of the Azure services, such as Database and Purview, and Informatica tools, such as Axon, and Data Governance, are among the things I am familiar with.

Informatica Professional Services should absolutely perform the installation due to its complexity. Additionally, training is required for end-client configuration. It is not something you can pick up and configure immediately.

Although there is no cloud version of it yet, it can be deployed in the cloud as a virtual machine, or VM.

Axon itself, you normally allow anywhere between five and ten days to conduct the installation configuration together, and that's not elapsed time. It normally takes a week to two weeks to install and configure an initial setup. This is elapsed time, not necessarily man hours. You will always need additional configuration to be done. Although the actual installation and configuration might be completed in a few weeks, getting it ready for use by the organization might take six months.

We do not have a technical team. I was the person who deployed this solution.

It was a challenge, but I did it for the POC.

Informatica Professional Services was consulted when it came time for the client's actual installation.

Axon can typically be present; the technical installation only requires one person, and a second data specialist is typically required for configuration. Normally two. Additional technical setup and data configuration are required.

It is definitely high if used properly, but many organizations spend all of the money and then fail to use it to its full potential. It is unquestionably a good investment if used properly.

It depends on how the client uses it.

Pricing is determined by the number of licensed users as well as the number of Core CPUs. 

You can imagine how expensive it would be for a company with 10,000 users, but it all depends on how many analyst user licenses they require. 

I believe there is a flat fee for the end user. 

It is not expensive, but individual licenses are required for technical users, data analysts, data stewards, and the data governance team, which can add up if you have a large number of them.

Different clients may have different licensing costs, but it is based on a yearly paid license. It is renewed every year. There is an initial licensing fee as well as an annual renewal fee.

They are very expensive, and they charge a lot because they know they are number one. I would rate them a five out of five. Five being the most expensive.

I would definitely recommend it. If they can afford it. I strongly advise them to use it. But, before diving into Axon or any of the other governance tools, make sure they understand their data landscape thoroughly because the tool will not help them with that. They will fail if they do not have good data practices in place.

I'm a freelancer, but the consultancy I went through is also independent, but they do have a partner relationship with Informatica, as they do with many vendors.

I would rate Informatica Axon a nine out of ten.

We primarily use the solution for tasks such as masking. It's used to mask the customer data.

We are using end-to-end features of Informatica. Everything comes under the product. We really like that the solution is part of a bigger use case that can all be under one umbrella system.

There are new features that are being built to help more closely link all of the solutions we use, and we like that they are always thinking about how each product interplays with the other.

We've used the solution for quite some time, so in our organization, the product is pretty mature.

There are lots of use cases surrounding the use of the product.

The integration could be a bit better. The process is something new. 

They need to include more documentation and support around the build.

It's my understanding that they are currently fixing quite a bit and building in updated capabilities in the upcoming version. We'll have to see what that looks like.

The general design of the resolution could simply be tweaked a bit.

I've been working with the solution for five or six years at this point. It's been quite a while.

We've worked on both the Windows and Linux platforms and have not had any issues with stability. It's been very good in both cases, and we have not faced any errors. There are no bugs and glitches. It doesn't crash.

We have 100 user licenses and we are using them in real-time. We work with an Indian bank that often requires more users. We can implement MDM to accommodate their needs at any given time.

I've worked with support from Oracle and a few other vendors, so I can compare it to those experiences. When I compare with other vendors, Informatica support is better, feedback-wise. Their documentation is great. They are very responsive to their customer base and very quick to respond to inquiries. We're very satisfied with their level of service.

I don't really have experience with other solutions. I only really know MDM.

The initial set up's complexity or simplicity depends on the requirements of the organization. Some have simpler implementation cases. Others are more complex. I would say for the simple to medium cases, the installation and deployment is very straightforward. 

When it comes to bigger builds, we need to be a bit careful in order to configure a few more settings to make it work properly. In general, the solution has simple to medium level complexity during the set up process.

The time for development usually takes a few days. It does depend on who is setting everything up. If you are well informed on the solution, the deployment process itself may only be a few hours. For a downtime point of view, you don't have too much time between products. Depending on when you do it, you can have 0% downtime as well, however, it would need to be strategically planned.

The solution has a couple of pricing models. You can go via can go a number of records, number of CPU, and various other items. I don't know what current model we follow. 

My experience on pricing is maybe four to five years old. I don't know what the current model is based on in our organization.

Although we're on version 10.3, we're working to move over to 10.4 soon. We're about to upgrade.

If you look at the Gartner quadrant, MDM is the top product. There are a few platforms available, however, I don't have good experience with other products in order to compare and to recommend. From my personal point of view, definitely I would recommend MDM.

I'd rate the solution seven out of ten. We're still testing a few capabilities that the solution provides, however, we aren't using them yet. We do plan to implement them in the future. Since we aren't extensively using the core features, I'm not giving them a higher score. We need to see how things progress.

The solution helps with cataloging and obtaining the data lineage. Informatica Enterprise Data Catalog also helps in identifying vital datasets, including the critical data elements and cataloging them. In our company, we have to manage the life cycle of the critical data elements and maintain the business glossary.

The definitions of the critical data elements, their linkage, lineage, as well as the relationships are managed using the solution. Informatica has been in the industry for decades, so they are one of the top SMB partners. 

At our company, along with the solution, we also use Informatica Intelligent Cloud Services REST API for app and system integrations in the packaging industry. Of our total portfolio, we integrated applications for about 20%, but we did not have any cloud presence; only a setup application was in the cloud. But for all the on-prem projects, the key components of the customer's product were integrated and governed by using Informatica. 

Data lineage is a valuable feature when, at our company, we design the physical elements and the logical components and need to identify the relation between them. 

The duplicate identification feature for two tickets, synonymous fields, or attributes is another vital aspect of Informatica Enterprise Data Catalog. The categorization of whether data is critical or not in the business glossary is another vital feature of the tool.  

The product is difficult for an untrained professional to operate. Specialized skills need to be acquired by learning the tool and executing it for data operations. Informatica Enterprise Data Catalog needs to be more user friendly, the UI is extremely complex.

For instance, if I have to view the tool, the first deterrent is that it gets highly technical. Thus, a limited number of professionals can understand the tool processes. Unless you are a data professional, it's very difficult to use Informatica Enterprise Data Catalog. The tool operates with Power BI sometimes.  

I have been using Informatica Enterprise Data Catalog for eight years. 

At our company, we haven't faced any downtime or business issues with the solution. The solution allows a limited number of users, so it's easier for the vendor to manage stability. 

I believe the solution is scalable and integrates satisfactorily. Our company was successful with scalability because, for the majority of our applications, where the key data was being hosted, we could integrate the apps quite easily with the cloud.

If Informatica Enterprise Data Catalog is being used, scaling the data up or down shouldn't be a problem. The solution's cloud integrations make scalability easier, unlike the on-prem version, which requires implementing complex security protocols. 

I would rate the customer support a nine out of ten. The product's support team has been highly responsive while solving the issues faced by our organization. 

Positive

At our company, during the product deployment, we had to asses our applications and APIs that would be connected, whether they were available out of the box or not. But the capabilities of customer connections are available with similar tools.

Informatica Enterprise Data Catalog offers custom connectivity. Therefore, the deployment process has been troublesome for our organization except for the mainframe. But as we kept using the tool we realized the integrations could be smoothly completed. At our company, we implement the product if customers are convinced to integrate the tool and make it their central, single source of data management for integrators and technicians. 

The deployment of the solution took more than a year in our organization, which included upgrades, contract renewals, and demonstrations similar to IDMC, provided by the same vendor. For deploying the on-prem version of Informatica Enterprise Data Catalog, a team of five engineers was needed in our company to manage the whole deployment and support process.

A couple of business analysts are needed to gather the users' requirements. Our organization has about ten members who provide on-call support on Informatica for its customers, comprising developers, business analysts, and testers. 

In our organization, we were able to derive about 70% of the critical data lineage. 

It's a costly solution. I would rate the pricing of Informatica Enterprise Data Catalog as six out of ten. 

The automated data lineage feature utilization depends upon the integration, which is why, in our organization, we had all our key applications integrated that derived automated lineages. But there were unknown applications as well, which, due to the lack of integrations, needed to be manually plugged in.

The mainframe integration with Informatica Enterprise Data Catalog is highly complex. At our organization, due to the aforementioned complexity, we had to import all the data of the mainframe into Informatica. If you are able to integrate the tool with your core applications and systems, then the data lineage duration is pretty simple and this structure is the same for competitor tools as well. 

In our company, we might explore in the near future how Informatica Enterprise Data Catalog can assist with AI capabilities. I would overall rate the solution as eight out of ten. To anyone looking to use Informatica Enterprise Data Catalog, I would say if they are willing to understand the company data, then the professional should gather sufficient technical knowledge about the product or take assistance from an Informatica expert because it's not a straightforward tool. 

We had proof of concepts where certain test cases were given to improve the functionality of the vendor regarding the supply chain.

So, it was a proof of concept. It was not applied in production.

It was just illustrating the capabilities of the platform, and we were comparing it with other platforms.

If we use it comprehensively, we can improve the data quality metrics or KPIs. 

So use as much data as you process, and have a solid strategy in place. If you don't have a comprehensive approach, then you don't draw any benefits or value from such a complicated platform. So, you have to have the objectives very well set up and be part of your daily activities in order to benefit from such a platform.

I like the connectivity and richness of features for the technical team, the maturity of the product, and that it had a cloud version. There is Informatica Cloud, and it is part of the Informatica Cloud platform.

It also has integration with other data governance tools from Infromatic, which is also good. 

It offers integration with some of the latest data platforms, streaming platforms like Kafka, for example. And the setup of the platform is very challenging.

Regarding the cloud, it is deployed in the private cloud of the vendor, so it poses challenges regarding the security of the data and the confidentiality of the data. There was no offering of a cloud version deployable in the client's tenant where all the data would reside.

I used it for a couple of months because it was only demoed for the client.

It is a stable product. 

The customer servive and support could be faster. There is a slow turnaround. 

Neutral

We just compared the data profiling features or data quality features between the tools. There was a rich functionality available in the system, but we did not draw any conclusions regarding how it improved or may have improved.

It was set up by the vendor for the demo. To deploy the Informatica Enterprise Data Catalog, you need at least two admins and architects. 

It enables business processes by providing trusted data that can be integrated into many processes around data.

It's very expensive. It's subscription-based. There are several levels of subscription.

The price is high, but the competitors are even higher and more experienced, like Collibra.

Overall, I would rate the solution a nine out of ten. 

I would recommend it due to the consistency of vision and very good integration between different products of Informatica. It offers wide coverage, the widest coverage of technologies from the major players.

What I like best about Informatica MDM is its structured, table-based approach. Unlike Reltio, where data is only visible through the UI and cloud-based, the solution allows access to normalized tables. This means I can directly query and see data in each table. For instance, I can easily get all customer details from the customer table. However, for more complex queries, like seeing all customer interactions with the organization, some SQL knowledge is needed to join different tables and retrieve the details.

The tool could be improved in terms of ease of use, particularly for those without technical expertise. Understanding and extracting data from the table-based structure requires some SQL knowledge and technical skills. Additionally, while Informatica MDM has moved towards a cloud-based MDM with a UI similar to Reltio, I haven't used it, so I can't comment on its effectiveness.

I have been working with the product for six months. 

I haven't had any issues with the tool's stability. 

I'm not entirely sure about scalability, but I've heard that adding custom features can be complicated. We have to go through several steps. First, we need to determine if we're adding a column to an existing Informatica MDM table or creating a new one. Then, we have to contact Informatica with our customization request. They do the customization. After that, we have to check if it's working correctly.

In our organization, we use Informatica MDM in a specific way. It's primarily based on tables; users don't directly log into it. The process works like this: data flows into the MDM tables as an inbound process. Once the master data merge has been completed, the output data flows out as an outbound process.

The tool's support team is good. The product is quite technical, and so is the support team. When we have questions, we reach out to them, and they provide answers. Their response time is also good—we don't have to wait long for replies.

Positive

I rate the overall product a seven out of ten. If you don't have the budget for Reltio, then you can go for Informatica MDM. 

The use cases attached to Informatica MDM may vary for different industries. Suppose I talk about industries related to healthcare and life sciences. In the aforementioned scenario related to healthcare and life sciences, there have been situations where a lot of sales representatives have issues while trying to set up calls with different physicians. Informatica or any MDM solution usually helps people in the healthcare industry optimize their business processes, especially when setting up calls with different physicians. Typically, Informatica MDM helps to reduce the number of duplicate details related to a physician or the data related to a particular organization data so that the sales representatives don't end up sending duplicate call invites to the same physician, especially those physicians who have probably different versions of their own name.

I think the integration feature is probably one of the key features in Informatica MDM. When compared to other Indian products, Informatica MDM has an edge due to its integration capabilities.

I don't see any area of improvement required when it comes to Informatica MDM since it is one of the leading products in the market. Some unification in Informatica MDM's UI side would probably make it better. I find Reltio more intuitive when compared to Informatica MDM's UI. Informatica MDM's UI is not intuitive enough. Informatica MDM's UI can be made a bit more intuitive.

I think all the latest up-to-date features are made available in Informatica solution. When it comes to Informatica MDM, all the features are mostly included, because of which there is nothing that needs to be added.

The long response time taken by the technical team of Informatica can be considered for improvement.

I have experience with Informatica MDM. I currently work for a company that has an alliance partnership with Informatica. I use Informatica to develop MDM solutions for my company's clients. I work as a solution provider since my company wants its employees to work as middlemen for Informatica products. In my company, we use Informatica to build solutions for clients. I use the latest version of Informatica MDM.

Stability-wise, I rate the solution a ten out of ten.

It is a highly scalable solution. Scalability-wise, I rate the solution a nine out of ten.

If it is for a single region deployment, the number of users who use the solution can vary somewhere between ten to fifteen, but if it is for a global deployment, then there could be hundreds of users who would use the solution.

The solution is used on a daily basis in my organization.

If there is a super high-priority issue, then the technical team of Informatica is super responsive. However, if it is a low-priority issue, they usually take a little longer than their usual response time. I rate the technical support an eight out of ten.

Positive

When it comes to Informatica MDM, it is mostly a cloud or SaaS-based product, because of which the configuration or setup phases may not pose a challenge. Most of the MDM solutions are now SaaS-based products that the product vendor maintains, and so such products are mostly accessed through web URLs over the cloud. Right now, any configuration or setup is not challenging, which used to be the case several years ago when these solutions were deployed on an on-premises model, because of which installation and other such procedures were required. Currently, most products are SaaS-based solutions, so there are no such challenges with respect to setup.

I rate the initial setup phase of Informatica MDM as a nine on a scale of one to ten, where one is difficult, and ten is easy.

Predominantly, Informatica MDM gets deployed on a public cloud. There is a provision to go ahead with if any of our company's clients want the product to be deployed on a private cloud, but it comes at a very high cost.

The time taken for the end-to-end deployment process depends on the complexity of the project that you are working on, but if I have to give you a standard answer, it would be approximately six months to start from scratch until production goes live.

Considering the members from the production and UAT departments, the UAT department dealt with the product for three weeks, and the overall deployment process took place over a month to a month and a half. Around eight staff members were required for the deployment process, including an Informatica developer responsible for configurations, a lead developer, two people for integration, a project manager, and one solution architect.

One of the in-house teams in my company carried out the deployment process.

I would say that the return on investment from the use of the solution is fairly good.

I rate the product's ROI a nine on a scale of one to ten, where one is zero percent return on investment, and ten is one hundred percent return on investment.

I rate the product's pricing a nine on a scale of one to ten, where one is low price, and ten is high price. The product does come at a certain cost since it is one of the best products in the market. The payments for the solution are made on a subscription-based model, meaning it is a pay-as-you-go model. In general, the costs attached to the solution depend on its usage.

The costs, in addition to the standard licensing fees for the solution, depend on users' requirements.

The people required for the maintenance of Informatica MDM depend upon the requirements of the clients who use the product.

I would say that a team of five people that includes a solution architect who operates in a partial capacity would be good enough to take care of Informatica MDM's maintenance phase.

I recommend the solution to those who plan to use it.

I rate the overall product a nine out of ten.