Data Integration Solutions for Salesforce: Informatica’s approach to cloud data integration

Informatica, Inc.

Software as a service (SaaS) is faster to deploy, simpler to upgrade, and 50 to 70 percent less expensive than on-premise equivalents, according to McKinsey Consulting. Yet SaaS still presents organizations with critical challenges:

• SaaS applications such as Salesforce CRM are typically managed by line-of-business users in sales, marketing, human resources, and customer support organizations. In many cases, these end users are also responsible for implementing and supporting the integration solution.

• SaaS applications "in the cloud" must integrate seamlessly with on-premise business data and applications to be able to deliver operational efficiency: providing end users with timely and accurate information when and as needed.

• Although many SaaS projects start at a departmental level with simple integration requirements in their initial phase of deployment, it is common for the integration complexity to grow as end-user adoption increases and the SaaS application becomes part of a broad enterprise architecture. SaaS applications require specialized integration services to allow smooth, trouble-free operations across the corporate firewall. Yet end users, who have only the most basic IT skills, often must be able to use SaaS applications with minimal IT support. This white paper describes Informatica's portfolio approach to SaaS integration and suggests a solution to these seemingly conflicting needs: a data integration approach that scales with customer requirements.