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Informatica Intelligent Data Management Cloud (IDMC) vs Microsoft MDS comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive Summary

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

Informatica Intelligent Dat...
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
6.8
Number of Reviews
214
Ranking in other categories
Data Integration (2nd), Data Quality (1st), Business Process Management (BPM) (5th), Business-to-Business Middleware (2nd), API Management (6th), Cloud Data Integration (3rd), Data Governance (3rd), Test Data Management (3rd), Cloud Master Data Management (MDM) (1st), Data Management Platforms (DMP) (2nd), Data Masking (2nd), Metadata Management (2nd), Integration Platform as a Service (iPaaS) (4th), Test Data Management Services (3rd), Product Information Management (PIM) (1st), Data Observability (2nd), AI Data Analysis (1st)
Microsoft MDS
Average Rating
7.4
Reviews Sentiment
7.2
Number of Reviews
23
Ranking in other categories
Master Data Management (MDM) Software (4th)
 

Featured Reviews

Divya-Raj - PeerSpot reviewer
Sr. Consultant cum Assistant Manager & Offshore Lead at Deloitte
Handles large data volumes effectively and offers competitive pricing
There is a lot of improvement required, as we still face some cache issues most of the time, which is a challenge that we expect to see resolved in the future. Additionally, there is some limitation when we are working with a tool, especially regarding In and Out parameters, and I feel that this aspect should be improved going ahead. We face issues with the API side, as Cloud Application Integration cannot handle large volumes; according to the API page, there is a limitation of 500 records or 500 MB. The AI integrated into the Informatica Intelligent Cloud Services solution is called Application Integration, where we still face challenges when dealing with huge volumes, as previously explained.
reviewer1524357 - PeerSpot reviewer
Solution Architect at a computer software company with 51-200 employees
Has supported endpoint management while revealing areas where usability and latency can improve
The couple of times we found issues with technical support from Microsoft for Microsoft MDS, they resolved them. The response time and understanding were adequate, though there was always a language barrier between the teams. The teams we worked with were in Korea, and it was sometimes a language issue.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"It has become an easy way to exchange information through any cloud application."
"It is quite easy to use and flexible."
"I think that it's a good solution...It is stable because we have the experience to deploy this solution."
"A great product enrichment tool."
"We can see all our information on a single screen."
"The solution's initial setup is quite straightforward."
"Informatica Cloud Data Integration is stable."
"The Mapping Designer allows for declarative ETL development (visual scripting) that leverages a wide array of different transformations."
"More generic related things can be included in the services."
"It has been a long-standing tool in our organization since it was free."
"The solution is easy to install."
"Enables non-technical people to directly interact with the BI system."
"The most valuable feature of Microsoft MDS is its compatibility with ETL tools like SSIS, which simplifies operations for end-users."
"Technical support is very good."
"The most valuable feature is the administration console."
"The best thing about it is that it comes with the Microsoft package."
 

Cons

"The price modeling could be more flexible."
"Informatica's issue is the licensing. Right now, there are a lot of new gen MDMs that are offering a lot in a single licensing model."
"User/group administration could use improvement."
"I used to use this tool more but recently we have been using another tool that we feel is better because it handles spatial data. Informatica Cloud Data Quality could improve by adding the ability to handle spatial data."
"The cloud version of the Informatica, it's a very substandard product. They might say it's enterprise-ready but it's not at all ready. They need to add more features, such as improved data replication features. If you look at other tools, such as Matillion they are now cloud-native and flexible. Additionally, Informatica Cloud Data Integration should have a good migration strategy from Informatica PowerCenter to Informatica Cloud Data Integration."
"The customer servive and support could be faster. There is a slow turnaround."
"Interoperability is one area where EDC has room for improvement. It was challenging when the faculty took over the data world and had specific vendors they wanted to use, and some were not particularly open platforms."
"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."
"JMD repositories have records that come in thousands and millions, which takes a long time to process."
"There are occasions when the solution maintains SD and we get duplications of MDS."
"From my understanding, MS, as of 2021, will not maintain the product going forward."
"The Microsoft license cost could be lower."
"It would be a better option to have an on-cloud version."
"In the next version, I would like to see integration with Azure."
"The solution could be better integrated into Microsoft's other products."
"Microsoft MDS is outdated and lacks modern capabilities."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"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."
"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."
"Cost-wise, I think it is on the higher side, and that is why we are looking for some better options. Licensing costs are huge compared to other players in the market and for my company."
"The product is very expensive"
"Informatica MDM is very expensive. Apart from licensing fees, they have broken down their products into multiple products, and they charge for each and every product. If the data is huge, they charge for the data. At times, we have to use third party services for data cleaning, and they charge for that as well."
"We pay for a yearly subscription."
"It is cost effective and an easily accessible tool."
"I rate Informatica MDM's price a six on a scale of one to ten, where one is a low price, and ten is a high price."
"MDS is a part of the SQL Server enterprise license. I am not aware of any additional costs."
"With Microsoft, we buy everything though an agreement, so we purchase volume licensing every year."
"Product licensing is very complicated. It would be helpful to have an online calculator to estimate the cost of a license."
"The pricing of this solution is good."
"Microsoft MDS is an expensive solution."
"I would like to see better pricing."
"SAP is more expensive than Microsoft."
"The solution does require a license and we have enterprise licenses."
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Answers from the Community

RT
Information Architect at Canadian Food Inspection Agency
Feb 7, 2022
Feb 7, 2022
Hi @Richard Tibbetts, There's no short answer to your question. Nearly all existing MDM solutions on the market offer a broad range of patterns to ingest master data from various sources and distribute cleanse and consolidated information, also to the Azure stack. Many vendors offer prebuilt connectors for the most common sources (databases, various file types, storages, business applications i...
2 out of 3 answers
InitZero - PeerSpot reviewer
Enterprise MDM Architect / Solution Arch at Volvo Group
Jan 14, 2022
Hi @Richard Tibbetts, There's no short answer to your question. Nearly all existing MDM solutions on the market offer a broad range of patterns to ingest master data from various sources and distribute cleanse and consolidated information, also to the Azure stack. Many vendors offer prebuilt connectors for the most common sources (databases, various file types, storages, business applications including MS Dynamics, Salesforce, etc.), but also support a generic way of ingesting/exposing data via Rest APIs, file drops, etc. MS MDS is an extension of the MS SQL server 2016. I don't know Microsoft plans to extend it, but I know that Profisee and CluedIn are very active in promoting their solutions as-built having Azure in mind and being a part of the stack. Informatica MDM has three types of offerings these days: on-prem, hosted MDM, and cloud-native option - they differ in the functionality and integration options. Obviously, there are many more MDM tools on the market particularly good in various data domains (products, customers/suppliers - so yours, multi-domain, etc). I think that you should start your MDM journey by answering which current challenges you try to solve or what new capabilities you need to enable to the organisation. Once these questions are answered and based on your organization's Enterprise Architecture principles, look for the best fitting tool. It may (or may not) be the one that fits the best into the Azure Reference Architecture. I hope this helped.
GM
Data Architect at World Vision
Feb 4, 2022
I agree with @InitZero...  I would add that there's no future roadmap for MDS and they don't have an Azure solution for it.  Since it's a free product with an SQL license, don't expect Microsoft to invest in it.   Even though we are highly dependent upon it currently I'm starting to look towards the future where we need to find a replacement - hopefully, a PaaS solution. It would be great if Microsoft came out with something in Azure but I'm not hopeful at this point.
 

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
14%
Manufacturing Company
11%
Computer Software Company
7%
Retailer
7%
Financial Services Firm
13%
Manufacturing Company
11%
Computer Software Company
10%
Media Company
8%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business51
Midsize Enterprise27
Large Enterprise153
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business9
Midsize Enterprise2
Large Enterprise15
 

Questions from the Community

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 ...
What do you like most about Microsoft MDS?
More generic related things can be included in the services.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Microsoft MDS?
Microsoft MDS was pretty affordable. We implemented the solution without a problem.
What needs improvement with Microsoft MDS?
I cannot really give specifics about disadvantages. From what we have seen, speaking to customers, Microsoft MDS was sometimes a bit slow. The frustration they had was just around usability and use...
 

Also Known As

ActiveVOS, Active Endpoints, Address Verification, Persistent Data Masking
Microsoft Master Data Services, Microsoft MDM, Microsoft SQL Server Master Data Services, MS MDS
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

The Travel Company, Carbonite
ETA a.s., Apeejay Surrendra Group, Blue Star Infotech, Rotherham Doncaster and South Humber NHS Foundation, The Sydney Children's Hospitals Network, New Belgium Brewing
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