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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
7.8
Reviews Sentiment
6.8
Number of Reviews
182
Ranking in other categories
Data Integration (3rd), Data Quality (1st), Business Process Management (BPM) (13th), Business-to-Business Middleware (4th), API Management (8th), Cloud Data Integration (3rd), Data Governance (2nd), Test Data Management (3rd), Cloud Master Data Management (MDM) Solutions (1st), Data Management Platforms (DMP) (1st), Data Masking (2nd), Metadata Management (1st), Test Data Management Services (3rd), Product Information Management (PIM) (1st), Data Observability (2nd)
Microsoft MDS
Average Rating
7.4
Reviews Sentiment
7.9
Number of Reviews
22
Ranking in other categories
Master Data Management (MDM) Software (2nd)
 

Mindshare comparison

While both are Data Integration and Access solutions, they serve different purposes. Informatica Intelligent Data Management Cloud (IDMC) is designed for Data Management Platforms (DMP) and holds a mindshare of 16.7%, up 14.1% compared to last year.
Microsoft MDS, on the other hand, focuses on Master Data Management (MDM) Software, holds 12.3% mindshare, down 13.9% since last year.
Data Management Platforms (DMP)
Master Data Management (MDM) Software
 

Featured Reviews

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.
Pierre Godard - PeerSpot reviewer
Adaptable for various industries and cost-effective
Microsoft MDS isn't getting strong support because Microsoft is focusing more on cloud solutions. Profisee initially made MDS, which Microsoft bought. Profisee now handles the cloud version. There are changes because MDS is the source for master data, and other tools like Dynamics 365 could replace it but aren't promoted for that purpose. I don't have any specific feature requests for MDS when it comes to the next release because Microsoft isn't actively supporting it. Any improvements would probably come from Profisee, the company that acquired MDS. Microsoft still owns MDS but isn't adding new features. Master data management is moving to the cloud or handled on-premises by Profisee MDS.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"MDM doesn't require a separate IDQ."
"The most valuable features of the solution are pushdown, optimization, and partitioning, which can be used for frequent data loading, especially when we have a huge data volume in our company."
"REST API: Excellent for scripting control and reporting mechanisms"
"The solution is stable."
"I like the fact that you can find almost any product connection that you need and the list is always expanding."
"The most valuable features of Informatica Cloud Data Integration for our clients are the AI capabilities within Informatica Intelligent Cloud Services."
"The interface is really good."
"The tool's most valuable feature is bulk upload. We upload files in CSV or Excel format."
"The best thing about it is that it comes with the Microsoft package."
"Unlike specialized tools, MDS is adaptable for various industries, making it a versatile choice for master data management."
"Compared to other databases, it is easier to manage and administer."
"The most valuable feature is the administration console."
"It has been a long-standing tool in our organization since it was free."
"Technical support is very good."
"The most valuable feature of Microsoft MDS is its compatibility with ETL tools like SSIS, which simplifies operations for end-users."
"What I like about Microsoft, is that it has a huge database with many users."
 

Cons

"I would rate my experience with the initial setup a two out of ten, with one being difficult and ten being easy."
"There's no direct way to connect to Amazon APIs from Informatica Cloud."
"This solution is hard to set up and its interface is not user-friendly. It's also not as stable, and the technical support takes a lot of time to solve simple problems."
"Its pricing model can be improved. The response time from technical support can also be improved."
"We cannot sell the product directly with an additional layer."
"Metadata querying is right now not there in Informatica Cloud Data Integration."
"New machine learning could be added to Informatica MDM because the solution is outdated and is not moving with the current trends. The solution is good, but it definitely needs a lot of improvement and needs to speed up as per the market."
"Certain shortcomings in the product's UI make it an area where improvements are required."
"In the next version, I would like to see integration with Azure."
"Stability can be fragile at times. If you are not attentive or make a mistake, it can cause problems."
"If Microsoft MDS were part of Azure, it would be significantly more helpful."
"There are occasions when the solution maintains SD and we get duplications of MDS."
"JMD repositories have records that come in thousands and millions, which takes a long time to process."
"Microsoft MDS isn't getting strong support because Microsoft is focusing more on cloud solutions."
"The Microsoft license cost could be lower."
"The only drawback is that it does not have the matching, merging, and all true MDM components. For these, you have to use another competent called Data Quality Services (DQS). You need to plug it in and use it along with MDS for true MDM. Both of these are integrated together, but you have to do them separately, whereas, in Profisee, there are a couple of screens where you can configure the matching process, create matching rules, and other things, and everything is in one product, which is not the case with MDS. In order to implement a true MDM, you need MDS, DQS, and SSIS. You have to use MDS to store your golden records, DQS to configure and standardize all your rules and matching percentages, and SSIS to load the data to DQS and MDS. At the same time, you also need Melissa Data to clean up your addresses to validate and standardize the addresses. That's the main component of true MDM. It would be good if they can create a true matching component inside MDS and merge MDS and DQS."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"It's pretty high for us. It's more on the higher side, like low to middle high."
"The product is very expensive"
"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."
"A yearly subscription is paid based on the number of people using the solution. Price-wise, it falls under the medium range since it is neither very costly nor too cheap."
"Informatica MDM's price could be lower."
"So, there are plans for licensing. There are subscription-based and usage-based licenses. Also, there are licenses for exceptional analytics, etc. In short, there are different models of licensing for every enterprise."
"It's an expensive solution."
"I rate the licensing cost of Informatica MDM a five out of ten."
"MDS is a part of the SQL Server enterprise license. I am not aware of any additional costs."
"The pricing of this solution is good."
"Microsoft MDS is an expensive solution."
"Product licensing is very complicated. It would be helpful to have an online calculator to estimate the cost of a license."
"With Microsoft, we buy everything though an agreement, so we purchase volume licensing every year."
"SAP is more expensive than Microsoft."
"I would like to see better pricing."
"The solution does require a license and we have enterprise licenses."
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Answers from the Community

RT
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
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
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
17%
Computer Software Company
12%
Manufacturing Company
10%
Insurance Company
6%
Computer Software Company
14%
Financial Services Firm
12%
Manufacturing Company
9%
Healthcare Company
7%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

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 is free. Currently, there is no pricing concern with the tool.
What needs improvement with Microsoft MDS?
Microsoft MDS is outdated and lacks modern capabilities. It is too slow and does not support automated mapping or AI-based functionalities. Although I created Python scripts for some machine learni...
 

Also Known As

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
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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