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Microsoft Nibbles at the MDM Buffet

Microsoft announced the acquisition of analytical MDM vendor Stratature. In doing so, Microsoft telegraphed certain aspects of their overall MDM strategy which has yet to be formally laid out for public review. Concurrently, midmarket CDI-MDM vendors received a timely extension of operational MDM market while mega MDM and best-of-breed MDM vendors servicing the Global 5000 scale enterprise carry on with business as usual.

  • Microsoft did *not* buy a full functionality CDI-MDM solution (e.g., possible targets for this would have been Cordys, DataFoundations, Initiate Systems, Purisma and Siperian).
  • Microsoft acquired only a modest, albeit vital, aspect of one dimension of the CDI-MDM ecosystem ("hierarchy management for analytical MDM").
  • Microsoft specified it is withdrawing Stratature's +EDM (enterprise dimension management) product from the market and will integrate the software into its Office Products software to provide consistent data across the SQL Server, Business Intelligence, SharePoint, and PerformancePoint product families.

While of great interest to the midmarket and SMB enterprises (those with less than $500 millionannual revenues), this announcement is a nonevent for Global 5000 size enterprises. Specifically, the current MDM capabilities of Microsoft (Stratature and SQL Server Integration Services (SSIS; formerly Data Transformation Services or DTS), et al) do not map to the current third generation requirements of the market prevalent CDI-MDM solutions available today. Meanwhile, type A enterprises and the CDI-MDM vendor community at large is already focused on fourth generation CDI-MDM requirements.

During 2007-08, Microsoft's initial MDM capabilities will be limited to analytical MDM for dimension and reporting hierarchy management - especially as a significant enhancement to the PerformancePoint Server capabilities during 2008-09. Enterprises requiring large enterprise scale or near real-time operational MDM capabilities should not expect product offerings from Microsoft prior to 2010-11 (unless Microsoft acquires one or more operational MDM vendors). During 2007-08, Microsoft MDM capabilities do not approximate even the current third generation MDM solutions - the latter which is the strategy of mega vendors IBM, Oracle, SAP and Teradata as well as best-of-breed MDM solutions such as DataFlux, Initiate Systems, Purisma and Siperian.

What Does This Mean for the Global 5000 Enterprise?

During 2008-09, users of Microsoft's ubiquitous business intelligence and office productivity tools will benefit from the ability to share (via SQL Server, SharePoint, etc.) master data entities via the enhanced hierarchy management capabilities of Stratature. The ability to manage hierarchies comprised of both structured and unstructured information will provide an interesting and potentially hyper productive means for departments and small division to organize themselves. By 2010-11, these "MDM marts" will capable of integration into the greater heterogeneous MDM capabilities of mega vendors such as IBM, Oracle, SAP and Teradata.

By 2010-11, SQL Server 2008 ("Katmai") should provide scalability into the tens of millions of customers such that Global 5000 enterprises will look to Microsoft MDM (if fully functionally as a fourth generation platform) and economical alternative to the mega vendor platforms.

What Does This Mean for the SMB Enterprise?

During 2008-09, users of Microsoft branded application packages (Dynamics for CRM, ERP, etc.) will begin to benefit from the hierarchy management capabilities of Stratature +EDM as it is used to provide "universal customer/product/supplier views" across Microsoft's CRM and ERP solutions.

As Global 5000 size enterprises' users benefit at the BI and office applications level, so too will small-to-medium size businesses.

Price points for SMB-appropriate MDM solutions (such as DataFlux, Oracle Customer Data Hub, Nimaya, etc.) will be under price pressure due to Microsoft's market presence and leverage.


Aaron Zornes is founder and chief research officer for the CDI-MDM Institute, with headquarters in San Francisco. He is the conference chairman for the Source Media/DM Review CDI-MDM SUMMIT series. Prior to the CDI-MDM Institute, Zornes founded and ran META Group's largest research practice for 15 years. He publishes the CDI-MDM Alert, a free biweekly email newsletter covering the the impact of the application of customer data integration (CDI), master data management (MDM) and data governance on Global 5000 enterprises. Register for the CDI-MDM Alert at http://www.tcdii.com/contactus.htmal. You may contact Zornes at aaron.zornes@tcdii.com.

Visit http://www.tcdii.com/takeoursurvey.html to complete a survey comparing your CDI-MDM implementation to your peers.

Zornes will conduct a CDI-MDM Boot Camp workshop at the CDI-MDM Summit in Sydney, Australia, May 28 and 29, 2007.  Register today at http://www.tcdii.com/events/cdimdmsummitseries.html.

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