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Alation Data Catalog vs Informatica Intelligent Data Management Cloud (IDMC) comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Nov 3, 2024

Review summaries and opinions

We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use. Here are some excerpts of what they said:
 

Categories and Ranking

Alation Data Catalog
Ranking in Data Governance
6th
Ranking in Metadata Management
2nd
Average Rating
7.6
Reviews Sentiment
6.9
Number of Reviews
11
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
Informatica Intelligent Dat...
Ranking in Data Governance
2nd
Ranking in Metadata Management
1st
Average Rating
7.8
Reviews Sentiment
6.8
Number of Reviews
182
Ranking in other categories
Data Integration (3rd), Data Quality (1st), Business Process Management (BPM) (11th), Business-to-Business Middleware (4th), API Management (8th), Cloud Data Integration (3rd), Test Data Management (3rd), Cloud Master Data Management (MDM) Solutions (1st), Data Management Platforms (DMP) (1st), Data Masking (2nd), Test Data Management Services (2nd), Product Information Management (PIM) (1st), Data Observability (2nd)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of March 2025, in the Data Governance category, the mindshare of Alation Data Catalog is 6.3%, down from 11.4% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Informatica Intelligent Data Management Cloud (IDMC) is 6.8%, down from 10.1% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Data Governance
 

Featured Reviews

Brahma Lam - PeerSpot reviewer
Has metadata cataloging features but needs changes in domain model
The tool's metadata cataloging is the most valuable feature.  The tool's domain model needs to be changed.  Alation Data Catalog is stable.  The solution is scalable.  Alation Data Catalog's deployment is easy. I rate it a nine out of ten. Deployment takes only two to three hours to complete.…
Raj Sethupathi - PeerSpot reviewer
Offers profiling and address standardization but can be complicated
Informatica Data Quality has its data warehouse, primarily using Oracle and some SQL databases. You need a database to host the data. The cleansed version of the data is stored in the data warehouse. It integrates with PowerCenter and other Informatica tools. The integration details can be complex, but a regional setup is involved in this process. Profiling smaller datasets, such as 10,000-50,000 records, worked fine. However, unexpected issues could arise with larger datasets, such as thousands of records or more, especially with tables containing many columns. Handling tables with fifty or more columns can be challenging, even in Excel. A mismatch in data types could cause the entire system to crash. Continual enhancements are being made to address these issues, which can be unique to specific industries like finance and healthcare.

Quotes from Members

We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use. Here are some excerpts of what they said:
 

Pros

"The platform's most valuable features are workflow automation, automated business metadata tagging, technical metadata tagging, and data integration with data quality tools or platforms."
"Alation Data Catalog's best feature is the SQL query publication."
"The most valuable features of Alation Data Catalog are the simplicity in onboarding data sources, the security in securing the data sources, and the way the various users of Alation Data Catalog communicate with each other through a messenger."
"The tool's metadata cataloging is the most valuable feature."
"Alation Data Catalog provides a nice interface for connecting to the database, querying the data, and working on it."
"The solution is used to query MySQL clients and store data and documentation."
"We can customize templates based on our use cases."
"The solution's most valuable feature is the ALLIE AI feature."
"It allows the creation of identical tasks that can be applied across multiple tables, ranging from 100 to even 1,000 tables."
"The product improves data quality."
"The scalability of the solution is excellent."
"Informatica Business Process Manager is easy to use and learn."
"The application integration will give you more flexibility when dealing with APIs."
"The most valuable features of Informatica MDM are its reliability, match functions, and integration capabilities. The out-of-box functionality of deduplication and built-in data models ensure faster implementation."
"Informatica MDM has data quality, mastering the data's capability."
"The most important features are the mastering of the data and the UI intuitiveness."
 

Cons

"The interface is not user-friendly."
"Alation Data Catalog doesn't support end-to-end lineage. By that, I mean the ability to trace the movement of data from when it first comes into our organization to where it's consumed."
"I know that this has been on their roadmap and they're working on it, but as a whole, there's an untapped reservoir of capabilities within their article features that could be used and built upon."
"It would be good if the tool could show the output from the records while querying."
"The product's data governance features need improvement."
"Although the solution performs far better in terms of data cataloging, its data governance capabilities need improvement."
"Alation Data Catalog needs to develop a lot in terms of data governance and would be improved with a built-in interactive data quality solution."
"Alation Data Catalog does not provide end-to-end data lineage."
"The ability of the product to leverage the power of big data could be improved."
"Informatica MDM could be improved by adding drag and drop options, business data insights, and visualization reporting."
"The only thing that I can imagine that might be improved is how the available transactions verify addresses used. These transactions have a valid end date and must be used within the agreed timeframe."
"Its features for partitioning and optimization could be better."
"If I compare it with other MDM solutions in the market, one thing that can definitely be improved is automation to help with the configuration. Currently, when we are creating any staging of base object tables, all the columns have to be configured manually in the Informatica Hub Console. A lot of tables and different kinds of business columns have to be configured manually. There should be an automated process for this, especially in the Dev environment. When people are creating tables and columns from scratch, if there is a backend automated process for that, it would be really helpful. In Stibo, a similar feature is there wherein you can tag attributes to certain objects. It would be helpful if Informatica also provides a similar option. It would reduce the manual effort. It could be that such a feature is already there, but I am not aware of it."
"We promote our code changes from a lower to a higher environment, which is highly complex when working with a multi-domain MDM like Informatica. This is the biggest obstacle for Informatica MDM, and I think they should change it because that's very time consuming."
"The UI is extremely complex"
"The configuration process is pretty lengthy and challenging and could be made easier to understand."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"I don't have all the details on the pricing side, but the solution was more expensive than originally expected."
"The platform is moderately expensive compared to the other competitors in the market."
"A three-year agreement is better than a one-year rolling 12-month agreement from a price point of view. I'd recommend looking at a three-year deal because you can't stand up a catalog and produce value in 12 months."
"The solution is a little expensive."
"I have no idea what the price actually is. It is probably not going to be the cheapest, but it is a pretty stable and robust platform from the backend standpoint."
"You pay for this solution based on IPUs, Informatica Processing Units. This depends on how much data you process and how much memory you consume from the cloud provider, and you pay as you go."
"The price of Informatica Cloud Data Integration could be reduced."
"Informatica MDM is a costly solution because it comes as a bundle. They are also globally positioning themselves and are definitely working on very upgraded technologies. If someone wanted to do it on the cloud, they have a lot of flexibility because they upgrade themselves according to the current needs. It definitely comes with a lot of features and that's the reason why it's costly. The licensing cost should be approximately one million dollars. It's about four to five times that of other vendors."
"It is cost effective and an easily accessible tool."
"Informatica MDM's pricetag should come down. They have to cut some costs."
"We saw an ROI. We have been able to get data from various sources and consolidate it into a data lake, which is helping us in data analytics."
"it's expensive, but if you're looking for a stable solution, Informatica MDM is a good one to choose."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
18%
Computer Software Company
10%
Government
8%
Manufacturing Company
8%
Financial Services Firm
17%
Computer Software Company
12%
Manufacturing Company
10%
Government
6%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about Alation Data Catalog?
The platform's most valuable features are workflow automation, automated business metadata tagging, technical metadata tagging, and data integration with data quality tools or platforms.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Alation Data Catalog?
I don't have all the details on the pricing side, but the solution was more expensive than originally expected. On a scale from one to ten, where one is cheap and ten is expensive, I rate the solut...
What needs improvement with Alation Data Catalog?
When issues arise, two key concerns arise. First, how can we perform root cause analysis faster? Second, how can we optimize resource allocation, considering the associated costs? Every customer is...
How does Azure Data Factory compare with Informatica Cloud Data Integration?
Azure Data Factory is a solid product offering many transformation functions; It has pre-load and post-load transformations, allowing users to apply transformations either in code by using Power Q...
Which Informatica product would you choose - PowerCenter or Cloud Data Integration?
Complex transformations can easily be achieved using PowerCenter, which has all the features and tools to establish a real data governance strategy. Additionally, PowerCenter is able to manage huge...
What are the biggest benefits of using Informatica Cloud Data Integration?
When it comes to cloud data integration, this solution can provide you with multiple benefits, including: Overhead reduction by integrating data on any cloud in various ways Effective integration ...
 

Also Known As

Alation
ActiveVOS, Active Endpoints, BPM, Address Verification, Persistent Data Masking, Cloud Test Data Management, PIM, , Enterprise Data Catalog, Data Integration Hub, Cloud Data Integration, Data Quality, Cloud API and App Integration
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Salesforce, Snowflake, Citrix, eBay, TripAdvisor, Albertsons, Nasdaq, Pfizer, LinkedIn, Finnair.
The Travel Company, Carbonite
Find out what your peers are saying about Alation Data Catalog vs. Informatica Intelligent Data Management Cloud (IDMC) and other solutions. Updated: February 2025.
842,388 professionals have used our research since 2012.