The Cure for Complexity: How Consolidation is Reshaping the Data Landscape

We’re at a pivotal moment in the data integration market. For years, the rallying cry for data professionals was to adopt the "modern data stack" (MDS), with the promise of a "best-of-breed" approach. This vision led many organizations to assemble a collection of specialized, single-purpose tools—one for ingestion, another for transformation, a third for quality, and so on—to create a highly effective data environment. However, reality has proven far more complex. What began as an agile, flexible approach has often resulted in a fragmented, difficult-to-manage, and costly ecosystem burdened by technical debt.

Moreover, buyers are no longer willing to manage dozens of vendor relationships, navigate complex integrations, or shoulder the burden of making disparate tools work together. The hidden costs—in maintenance, data governance, and human effort—far outweigh the perceived benefits of this approach. Customers now demand simplicity over complexity. They seek a single, trusted partner that can deliver an end-to-end platform to meet their data needs.

The market’s response to this trend is no longer theoretical; it’s evident in major industry moves. Salesforce’s acquisition of Informatica is a powerful signal. As a titan in the CRM space, Salesforce is betting that the future of AI and business applications hinges on a unified data foundation. By integrating Informatica’s data management, quality, and governance capabilities, Salesforce aims to become a one-stop shop for a seamless data-to-insights pipeline.

Last week’s news of Fivetran’s acquisition of Tobiko Data reinforces the same principle, albeit on a smaller scale. Fivetran, traditionally focused on data movement, is now expanding into the transformation layer. This move directly addresses a key pain point for customers who previously had to manually integrate Fivetran’s ingestion capabilities with separate transformation tools, such as dbt Core.

These acquisitions are not isolated events; they signal a fundamental shift in the data integration market from point solutions to unified platforms.

This trend is validated by new Gartner research published titled “Future of Data Management Markets: Converged Data Management Platforms Drive Tool Consolidation” which makes specific recommendations for organizations to rethink their vendor strategy and architectures. “Avoid adding more single-purpose data management tools. Although these point-solutions can be useful for specialized needs, consider whether the extra effort to integrate multiple tools is worth it compared to the faster results you can get from unified platforms.”

At Qlik, we’ve long recognized the need for a comprehensive platform. Our strategic acquisitions over the past decade, including Talend and Attunity, reflect our commitment to delivering a single, unified solution that spans data integration, quality, analytics, and AI. This approach empowers businesses to focus on deriving value from their data rather than wrestling with disconnected tools. A good example of this is Truist, a financial services company that partners with Qlik to modernize its data architecture and tackle new AI initiatives without taking on additional complexity or vendors. Here is a link to read more and watch an interview with Harveer Singh, Former CDO for Truist.

Customers have spoken, the market has responded, and Qlik is well-positioned to lead the next wave of innovation, driven by agentic AI.