Is your data ecosystem too fragmented?
Your data is scattered across multiple clouds and legacy systems. This makes getting a single, unified view of your information nearly impossible.
This fragmentation stalls analytics and AI projects. It’s a huge barrier to making timely, data-driven decisions that drive business growth.
The need to fix this is urgent. Coherent Market Insights reports a 23.2% CAGR growth in data fabric adoption for 2024-2025. This shows many are trying to solve this exact problem.
A data fabric architecture is the answer. It helps you unify data without complex migrations, giving you control over your entire data environment.
In this article, I’ll guide you through the best data fabric software available. We will look at solutions designed to unify your hybrid cloud architecture effectively.
You’ll learn how to overcome decision paralysis and choose a tool that maintains governance standards for your AI and ML workloads.
Let’s get started.
Quick Summary:
| # | Software | Rating | Best For |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Talend → | Enterprises with hybrid cloud | |
| 2 | Informatica → | Large enterprises | |
| 3 | Denodo → | Complex hybrid cloud enterprises | |
| 4 | Qlik → | IT directors & data engineers | |
| 5 | K2View → | Organizations needing real-time data |
1. Talend
Is your data unified across your hybrid cloud?
Talend Data Fabric combines data integration, quality, and governance within a single, low-code platform. This means you can build a trusted data foundation to power your AI, ML, and analytics solutions.
This unified approach helps you overcome decision paralysis caused by conflicting vendor claims, ensuring your data is reliable and accessible.
Here’s how Talend delivers.
Talend provides an end-to-end platform for modern data management. It supports virtually any data source and architecture, streamlining operations.
You can deploy Talend on-premises, cloud, multi-cloud, or hybrid-cloud, offering the flexibility your diverse infrastructure requires. This flexibility is crucial for unifying hybrid cloud environments and integrating legacy systems without disruption.
Additionally, Talend fosters deep partnerships and integrations with top technology providers like AWS, Azure, and Snowflake, enhancing data value. This makes managing your data ecosystem straightforward, reducing replication and improving data lineage for better AI/ML accuracy.
Transforming your data into business outcomes.
Before diving deeper, you might find my analysis of best form management software helpful for other aspects of your digital operations.
Key features:
- Unified Platform: Integrates data, quality, and governance into a single low-code platform for comprehensive, trusted data management.
- Flexible Deployment: Supports on-premises, cloud, multi-cloud, and hybrid-cloud deployments, adapting to your specific infrastructure needs.
- Enhanced Ecosystem: Offers deep integrations with major cloud providers, ensuring seamless connectivity and greater value from your existing data environment.
Learn more about Talend features, pricing, & alternatives →
Verdict: Talend Data Fabric stands out as a strong candidate for the best data fabric software, particularly for enterprises navigating hybrid cloud complexities. It helps unify 85,000 data sources, turning real-time analytics into 11% revenue growth, and boosting product take-up rates by 5x through trusted, integrated data, which directly addresses common challenges.
2. Informatica
Is your data ready for AI?
Informatica’s Intelligent Data Management Cloud (IDMC) helps you unify hybrid cloud environments. This means your data infrastructure is modernized, supporting enterprise use cases with AI-powered cloud data management.
The IDMC ensures your data is AI-ready with enterprise-level scalability, security, and compliance, addressing complex integration across multi-cloud architectures.
Here’s your solution.
Informatica helps you realize business value by managing the entire data lifecycle. This simplifies data access and automates labor-intensive tasks, delivering measurable return on data investments.
IDMC provides multi-cloud and hybrid capabilities with 50,000+ metadata-aware connections, ensuring global scale and flexible pricing. Plus, it enables you to establish more trust in your data, stopping the guesswork about data accuracy.
Additionally, Informatica focuses on optimizing your data investments and allowing your team to create business value faster by putting the right data at their fingertips. It offers integrated data and AI services, including Data Catalog, Data Integration, Data Quality & Observability, and Governance, Access & Privacy.
The result is better AI with better data.
Beyond unifying data, ensuring data security is paramount. For more on protecting your information, check out my guide on data loss prevention software.
Key features:
- Intelligent Data Management Cloud: Unifies data access across multi-cloud and hybrid environments, supporting real-time analytics and IoT integration while ensuring security and compliance.
- CLAIRE AI-Powered Automation: Simplifies data management, automates tasks, and prepares your data for AI workloads, enhancing accuracy and reducing manual effort.
- Comprehensive Data Governance: Provides Data Quality & Observability, MDM & 360 Applications, and Governance, Access & Privacy to maintain robust control over your data.
Learn more about Informatica features, pricing, & alternatives →
Verdict: Informatica’s Intelligent Data Management Cloud is a best Data Fabric software solution that unifies hybrid cloud architectures, ensuring trusted data for AI/ML workloads. Its CLAIRE AI automation, robust governance, and 50,000+ metadata-aware connections address complex integration and compliance, making it ideal for large enterprises.
3. Denodo
Struggling to unify your complex hybrid cloud data?
Denodo provides a universal semantic layer for unified, real-time, and secure data access. This means accelerating the delivery of trusted AI-ready data.
You can centralize governance and secure data from a single control point, which is crucial for maintaining compliance across your enterprise.
Here’s how to simplify data management.
Denodo’s platform accelerates data unification and delivery, giving your business access to trusted AI-ready data products and self-service insights. This includes reducing time to prepare data for AI by 67% and decreasing delivery time by 65%.
You get a universal semantic layer that delivers data in a consistent format, making it easily understood and actionable for all end users and applications. This enhances operational resilience and efficiency, and also supports IT modernization efforts.
Additionally, Denodo offers flexible deployment options like traditional on-premises or private cloud deployment, or Agora, a fully managed cloud service handling infrastructure, scalability, and security for you. This allows you to choose what best fits your existing environment.
The result is a unified, trusted data foundation for AI.
While we’re discussing enhancing operational efficiency, my article on best virtual pbx systems offers more ways to cut costs.
Key features:
- Universal Semantic Layer: Delivers a consistent, easily understood data format across all users and applications for better self-service insights.
- Unified Secure Data Access: Provides a single access layer to integrate, manage, and secure all enterprise data, regardless of its location or source.
- Trusted AI-Ready Data: Accelerates the delivery of reliable, high-quality data products essential for AI initiatives and improved data science projects.
Learn more about Denodo features, pricing, & alternatives →
Verdict: Denodo stands out as a strong contender for the best data fabric software, particularly for enterprises needing to unify complex data ecosystems for AI and self-service. Their focus on reducing data preparation time for AI by 67% and improving query performance by over 10x positions them well for technical decision-makers.
4. Qlik
Struggling to unify your complex hybrid cloud data?
Qlik’s comprehensive platform tackles this head-on, delivering a complete range of capabilities for your data needs. This means you can easily build and manage your data integration and analytics solutions.
Here’s how you gain total control over your data.
Qlik helps you activate all your data.
Their solutions empower you to activate data from across your organization, from raw sources to refined insights. This means you can leverage the full potential of your information for better decision-making. Additionally, Qlik offers active intelligence, which ensures your data is always current and ready for analysis, supporting your critical AI/ML workloads. The result is improved data lineage and accuracy for your models.
Your data fabric journey starts here.
Key features:
- Automated Data Pipelines: Offers automated data delivery, refinement, and transformation into analytics-ready information, ensuring your data is always current and accessible.
- Comprehensive Data Integration: Provides a wide array of integration capabilities, from real-time data streaming to data warehousing automation, unifying diverse data sources.
- AI/ML Readiness: Powers your AI and machine learning initiatives with reliable, governed data, enhancing model accuracy and supporting advanced analytics.
Learn more about Qlik features, pricing, & alternatives →
Verdict: Qlik positions itself as a robust solution for IT directors and data engineers seeking the best data fabric software. Its focus on automated data pipelines, comprehensive integration, and AI/ML readiness directly addresses challenges in unifying hybrid cloud environments and ensuring data governance for critical workloads, making it a strong contender.
5. K2View
Struggling with fragmented data across your hybrid cloud?
K2View offers a Data Product Platform with Micro-Database Technology, designed to unify diverse data sources.
This means you can overcome the challenge of balancing feature depth with integration complexity, ensuring unified data access across all your silos.
Ready to transform your data operations?
K2View introduces generative data products that liberate and cleanse data from any source, packaging it with context and guardrails for immediate use. Plus, its Micro-Database™ core creates isolated, lightning-fast datasets for each business entity, like customers. This ensures ultimate privacy and security for your sensitive information. Additionally, AI-automated data engineering streamlines the entire data product lifecycle, from discovery to pipeline generation, helping non-technical users build data products quickly. The result is protected, complete data in real time, always.
Get your data AI-ready now.
Before diving deeper into features, you might find my analysis of data analysis tools helpful for maximizing your data’s potential.
Key features:
- Data Product Platform: Enables creation, testing, and deployment of generative data products that integrate, cleanse, and package data from any source for AI and operational workloads.
- Micro-Database™ Technology: Manages isolated, micro-sized datasets for each business entity, providing lightning-fast, low-cost access while ensuring ultimate privacy and security.
- AI-Automated Data Engineering: Streamlines the data product lifecycle through automated data discovery, classification, and auto-generation of data pipelines and services, accelerating time to data value.
Learn more about K2View features, pricing, & alternatives →
Verdict: K2View stands out as a strong contender for the best data fabric software, particularly with its Micro-Database™ technology and AI-automated data engineering. This approach simplifies enterprise data integration, customer 360, and test data management, making it ideal for organizations aiming for protected, real-time data at AI scale and speed.
6. IBM
Struggling with complex data unification in your hybrid cloud?
IBM offers AI-powered automation and no-code tools to build agents for real workflows.
This means you can automate processes for sales and procurement, addressing common operational hurdles and going from AI pilots to full production.
Here’s how IBM simplifies your data challenges.
IBM helps you unify your hybrid cloud architecture by providing advanced AI technologies and robust analytics. This supports data-driven decisions for your business.
You can effortlessly integrate AI agents into your business operations, enhancing various functions and transforming sales performance through automation. Their software unifies agentic governance and security, ensuring control over your AI.
Additionally, IBM offers cost-efficient AI models tailored for business and optimized for scale, enabling you to build smart, learn fast, and monitor AI performance with watsonx.governance. You can handle mission-critical workloads while maintaining security and reliability.
Unlock unified data access with IBM.
As businesses strive for efficiency, managing internal processes well is crucial. My guide on best PTO tracking software can help streamline your operations.
Key features:
- AI-powered automation with no-code tools: Automate real workflows for sales and procurement, building custom agents to enhance business operations and productivity.
- Unified agentic governance and security: Gain control over your AI projects and maintain robust security across your hybrid cloud and AI with data and identity-centric solutions.
- Scalable AI models and robust analytics: Leverage cost-efficient AI models optimized for scale and powerful analytics to support data-driven decisions for your organization.
Learn more about IBM features, pricing, & alternatives →
Verdict: IBM stands out as a strong candidate for the best data fabric software, particularly for enterprises seeking to unify hybrid cloud environments and leverage AI. Its focus on AI-powered automation, unified governance, and scalable models directly addresses the need for reduced data replication and improved AI/ML accuracy, helping your organization sustain financial returns from AI projects.
7. CluedIn
Struggling with fragmented data across your hybrid cloud?
CluedIn offers an augmented data management platform, providing a secure and scalable supply of high-quality data. This means you can accelerate the process of preparing data for insights and digital transformation.
You don’t want to spend months modeling data or constantly fixing complex issues. CluedIn addresses this by offering a zero-modeling, schemaless approach, making Master Data Management easier, smarter, and faster.
Here’s how to simplify your data journey.
CluedIn streamlines Master Data Management, delivering high-quality, compliant data by automating the hardest parts of the journey. This enables you to accelerate critical, data-fueled projects.
The platform provides powerful AI features, including Azure OpenAI and the CluedIn AI Assistant, which automatically clean, standardize, and deduplicate data. This helps you achieve a unified view of your data from diverse sources, enhancing customer experiences and driving growth. Additionally, virtual AI Agents work 24/7, automating repetitive data quality tasks and freeing your team to focus on strategic goals at no extra cost. You can also integrate structured and unstructured data from thousands of sources with a low-code UI.
The result is trust in data and smarter, data-driven decisions.
Key features:
- Augmented Data Management: Integrate and prepare data quickly for insights, accelerating digital transformation whether deployed as SaaS or PaaS.
- Native Microsoft Azure Integrations: Connects with 27 different Azure services, including Microsoft Fabric, Purview, and Azure OpenAI, for enhanced governance and AI readiness.
- Automated Data Quality & Governance: Features like AI Agents, automated matching, and survivorship ensure high-quality, compliant data with zero upfront modeling.
Learn more about CluedIn features, pricing, & alternatives →
Verdict: CluedIn stands out as the best data fabric software for unifying hybrid cloud architectures, especially for those using Microsoft Azure. Its zero-modeling, AI-powered automation and native integrations allow you to quickly achieve high-quality, compliant data, enhancing operational efficiency and customer experiences.
Conclusion
Finally unify your data ecosystem.
Choosing the right tool to connect your hybrid cloud and legacy systems is a monumental challenge. The risk of decision paralysis is high for any IT director.
Coherent Market Insights projects 27.8% CAGR growth projections for companies using data fabric by 2029. This highlights the massive potential you can unlock with the right tool.
So what’s the best choice?
From my experience, Talend is the clear winner for most organizations. It directly tackles hybrid cloud complexity with its unified, low-code platform for data management.
I’ve seen it help unify 85,000 data sources, boosting revenue by 11%. When you implement the best data fabric software like Talend, you turn trusted data into real business outcomes.
For additional insights, my analysis of form automation software provides valuable perspectives.
I recommend you start a free trial of Talend. See for yourself how it simplifies data integration and governance.
You’ll finally gain control over your data.
