Gartner

Two Ways of Exploiting Big Data with MDM

Henrik Gabs Liliendahl7 Comments
MDM Wordle
This is not the quadrant, just some vendor names

The Gartner 2015 Magic Quadrant for Master Data Management of Customer Data Solutions is out. One way of getting the report without being a Gartner customer is through this link on the Informatica site.

Successful providers of Mater Data Management (MDM) solutions will sooner or later need to offer ways of connecting MDM with big data.

In the Customer MDM quadrant Gartner, without mentioning if this relates to customer MDM only or multi-Domain MDM in general, mentions two ways of connecting MDM with big data:

  • Capabilities to perform MDM functions directly against copies of big data sources such as social network data copied into a Hadoop environment. Gartner have found that there have been very few successful attempts (from a business value perspective) to implement this use case, mostly as a result of an inability to perform governance on the big datasets in question.
  • Capabilities to link traditionally structured master data against those sources. Gartner have found that this use case is also sparse, but more common and more readily able to prove value. This use case is also gaining some traction with other types of unstructured data, such as content, audio and video.

My take is that these ways applies to the other MDM domains (supplier, product, location, asset …) as well – just as I think Gartner sooner or later will need to make only one MDM quadrant as pondered in the post called The second part of the Multi-Domain MDM Magic Quadrant is out.

Also I think the ability to perform governance on big datasets is key. In fact, in my eyes master data will tend to be more externally generated and maintained, just like big data usually is. This will change our ways of doing information governance as discussed in my previous post on this blog. This post was by the way inspired by the Gartner product MDM person. The post is called MDM and SCM: Inside and outside the corporate walls.

The Multi-Domain Data Quality Tool Magic Quadrant 2014 is out

Henrik Gabs Liliendahl5 Comments

Gartner, the analyst firm, has a different view of the data quality tool market than of the Master Data Management (MDM) market. The MDM market has two qudrants (customer MDM and product MDM) as reported in the post The Second part of the Multi-Domain MDM Magic Quadrant is out. There is only one quadrant for data quality tools.

Well, actually it is difficult to see a quadrant for product data quality tools. Most data quality tools revolves around the customer (or rather party) domain, with data matching and postal address verification as main features.

For the party domain it makes sense to have these capabilities deployed outside the MDM solution in some cases as examined in the post The place for Data Matching in and around MDM. And of course data quality tools are used in heaps of organizations who hasn’t a MDM solution.

For the product domain it is hard to see a separate data quality tool if you have a Product Information Management (PIM) / Product MDM solution. Well, maybe if you are an Informatica fan. Here you may end up with a same branded PIM (Heiler), Product MDM (Siperian) and data quality tool (SSA Name3) environment as a consequence of the matters discussed in the post PIM,  Product MDM and Multi-Domain MDM.

What should a data quality tool do in the product domain then? Address verification would be exotic (and ultimately belongs to the location domain). Data matching is a use case, but not usually something that eliminates main pain points with product data.

Some issues that have been touched on this blog are:

Anyway the first vendor tweets about the data quality tools quadrant 2014 is turning up, and I guess some of the vendors will share the report for free soon.

Magic Quadrant for Data Quality Tools 2014

Update 3rd December: I received 3 emails from Trillium Software today with a link to the report here.

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From Business Glossary to Full-Blown Metadata Management or Vice Versa

Henrik Gabs Liliendahl3 Comments

A very common starting point for producing tangible outcomes in a data governance programme is setting up a business glossary. The alternatives, or next/previous steps, for a business glossary were discussed in the post Metadata Musings by a Nerd.

First, in my eyes a business glossary (or whatever you call such a thing) is indeed a useful deliverable in its own right. In order to support a data governance programme you will need to add things besides definition of terms. One important element is documenting business rules as reported by Nikki Rogers at The University of Bristol here.

metadata

A business glossary should ultimately morph into full-blown metadata management or meet data dictionary and/or metadata repository initiatives that also may grow in your organization. What full-blown metadata management means was touched recently by Brian Brewer in a blog post called Gartner Says More Metadata. This post cites a blog post by Darin Stewart of Gartner (the analyst firm). The Gartner post is called Big Content Needs More Metadata.

How did you develop your business glossary?

  • Did you start with a business glossary and then morphed into the data dictionary and metadata management discipline and lingo?
  • Did the business glossary grow from the metadata management work?
  • Is the business glossary just sitting there doing what it does?

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The second part of the Multi-Domain MDM Magic Quadrant is out

Henrik Gabs Liliendahl10 Comments

Gartner, the analyst firm, recently released their magic quadrant for Master Data Management (MDM) of customer data solutions 2014 as reported in the post Customer MDM Magic Wordles.

Now the quadrant for Master Data Management of product data solutions 2014 is out too, so we can overlay the two quadrants and see how multi-domain Master Data Management (MDM) solutions are doing in terms of who are performing well with product master data and who are performing well with customer master data.

If we focus on leading vendors with differences in quadrant positioning, Informatica is better positioned with customer master data (leader) than with product master data (visionary and niche with two different products). Stibo Systems and Riversand are positioned very well within product master data (leaders) but not positioned at all with customer master data, though both vendors are naming themselves as multi-domain MDM solution providers and surely have such capabilities. I personally worked on the multi-domain roadmap with one of them some years ago.

MDM Brands
This is not the quadrant. Just some vendor names.

 

As every year the vendors makes press releases about the quadrant.

Upen Varanasi, CEO of Riversand, has commented in this way: “In this new Digital world, accurate product and other master information is a foundation for our customers’ major business initiatives, which requires a comprehensive, highly scalable and flexible MDM solution with full multi-domain capabilities.” See the full press release from Riversand here.

Mikael Lyngsø, CEO of Stibo Systems says: “Every member of the Stibo Systems’ team remains committed to providing our customers and partners with cutting edge solutions that not only meet their most pressing business issues but also create the most lasting and demonstrable value.” The about the company section has this bold statement: “Stibo Systems is the global leader in multidomain Master Data Management (MDM) solutions.” Read the full press release here.

Rob Karel, vice president, Product Strategy and Product Marketing, MDM, Informatica says: “We continue to deliver a multidomain MDM solution that, in combination with Informatica PIM, delivers end-to-end customer, product and supplier information governance and stewardship. Delivering complete, reliable and consistent product information – across every channel – is the key to a great customer experience.” Informatica also kindly provides a free copy of the report. Get the Magic Quadrant for Master Data Management of Product Data Solutions 2014 here.

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Customer MDM Magic Wordles

Henrik Gabs Liliendahl2 Comments

The Gartner Magic Quadrant for Master Data Management of Customer Data 2014 is out. One place to get it for free is by using the Informatica registry style page offered in the Informatica communication here.

So, what is good and what is bad when looking for a MDM vendor if you are focusing on customer data right now?

Some words in the strengths assessment of vendors are:

Magic plus

Some words in the cautions assessment of vendors are:

Magic minus

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The “Fit for Purpose” Trap

Henrik Gabs Liliendahl7 Comments

Gartner (the analyst firm), represented by Saul Judah, takes data quality back to basics in the recent post called Data Quality Improvement.

While I agree with the sentiment around measuring the facts as expressed in the post I have cautions about relying on that everything is good when data are fit for the purpose for business operations.

Some clues lies in the data quality dimensions mentioned in the post:

Accuracy (for now):

As said in the Gartner post data are indeed temporal. The real world changes and so does business operations. When you got your data fit for the purpose of use the business operations has changed. And when you got your data re-fit for the new purpose of use the business operations has changed again.

Furthermore most organizations can’t take all business operations into account at the same time. If you go down the fit for purpose track you will typically address a single business objective and make data fit for that purpose. Not at least when dealing with master data there are many business objectives and derived purposes of use. In my experience that leads to this conclusion:

“While we value that data are of high quality if they are fit for the intended use we value more that data correctly represent the real-world construct to which they refer in order to be fit for current and future multiple purposes”

Existence – an aspect of completeness:

The Gartner post mentions a data quality dimension being existence. I tend to see this as an aspect of the broader used term completeness.

For example having a fit for purpose completeness related to product master data has been a huge challenge for many organizations within retail and distribution during the last years as explained in the post Customer Friendly Product Master Data.

Omni

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An Alternative Multi-Domain MDM Quadrant

Henrik Gabs Liliendahl4 Comments

No, this is not an(other) attempt to challenge Gartner, the analyst firm, in making quadrants about vendors in the Master Data Management (MDM) realm.

This an attempt to highlight some capabilities of Multi-Domain MDM solutions here focusing on party and product master data and the sell-side and the buy-side of MDM as discussed some years ago in the post Sell-side vs Buy-side Master Data Quality.

A simple quadrant will look like this:

Quadrant

  • The upper right corner is where MDM started, being with solutions back then called Customer Data Integration (CDI).
  • The Product Information Management (PIM) side is quite diverse and depending on the industry vertical where implemented:
    • Retailers and distributors have their challenges with sometimes high numbers of products that goes in and comes out as the same but with data reflecting different viewing points.
    • Manufacturers have other issues managing raw materials, semi-finished products, finish products and products and services used to facilitate the processes.
    • Everyone have supplies.
  • The supplier master data management has more or less also been part of the PIM space but looks more like customer master data and should be part of a party master data discipline also embracing other party roles as employee.

Also, this quadrant is by the way without other important domains as location (as discussed in the post Bringing the Location to Multi-Domain MDM) and asset (as discussed in the post Where is the Asset?)

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The True Leader in Product MDM

Henrik Gabs Liliendahl10 Comments

Magic Quadrants from Gartner are the leading analyst report sources within many IT enabled disciplines. This is also true in the data management realm and one of quadrants here is the Gartner Magic Quadrant for Master Data Management of Product Data Solutions.

The latest version of this quadrant was out in November last year as reported in the post MDM for Product Data Quadrant: No challengers. A half visionary.

Most quotations after a quadrant release are vendors bragging about their position in the quadrant and this habit will possibly also repeat itself when the next quadrant for product MDM is out.

But I think Gartner has got it all wrong here during all the years. As I have seen it, Microsoft is the true leader and the rest of the flock are minor niche players.

Product MDM

Excel rules.

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Attending a MDM Summit

Henrik Gabs Liliendahl3 Comments

Going to MDM (Master Data Management) conferences is a great learning experience.

If we look at world-wide conferences there are two series of conferences going on every year:

  • The Master Data Management Summit series lead by the MDM Institute, which is Aaron Zornes
  • The Master Data Management summit series organized by Gartner (the analyst firm)

Both those traveling events are coming to London this spring. First up is the Gartner event the 12th and 13th March. As I have been to the Zornes show several times before, I am looking forward to be at the more expensive Gartner performance this year.

The learning actually starts when you are looking at company names on the attendee list. Some master data issues are showcased here:

There will be people from these three well-known British supermarkets:

GartnerMDM 1

The good folks at Kühne + Nagel (AG & Co.) KG is having a hard time putting their proper name in there:

GartnerMDM 2

And what a timely name for this Swiss company:

GartnerMDM 3

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Multi-Domain MDM Uptake

Henrik Gabs Liliendahl3 Comments

Within Master Data Management (MDM) doing multi-domain MDM has been trending for a couple of years. Yesterday Gartner (the analyst firm) had a chat session on twitter preceding the upcoming Gartner MDM summits around the world.

Along the way @BillOKane of @Gartner_inc revealed some numbers about multi-domain MDM from the Gartner camp:

Multi-Domain 1

Multi-Domain 2

So, stating these numbers using the MoSCoW method we have that among companies considering MDM:

  • 3 % sees multi-domain MDM as a MUST have now
  • 10 % thinks they SHOULD have multiple-domain MDM now
  • 17 % regards multi-domain MDM as something they COULD have now
  • 70 % WONT have multi-domain MDM now

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