The latest Gartner Magic Quadrant (MQ) for Data Integration Tools report explains how growth in the market is set to decline as data management platforms converge.
Data source silos exist and persist. Data integration tools extract data, transform it, and send it upstream, or load it (ETL) to destinations for analysis or other processing. Data integrators such as Airbyte, Confluent, dbt Labs, Denodo, Fivetran, Informatica, and Precisely supply specific connectors or adapters to link to data sources, select and copy data, reformat it if necessary, and then move it to targets. As long as there are multiple data sources and multiple processing targets, there will be data integrators – 20 of them in this case.
As an example of the scope of the data integration business, Fivetran has 740 separate connectors, more than 7,700 customers, and moves 7.2 petabytes of data each month.
This MQ (see bootnote) looks at standalone data integration tools from suppliers who generated at least $50 million in software revenue from data integration tools in calendar 2024, or maintain at least 500 subscription or maintenance-paying customers, with at least 50 of those customers being new over the past year. There is also a geographic market presence requirement.
It identifies nine leaders, three challengers, four niche players, and four visionaries:
The leaders include three public clouds: AWS, Microsoft (Azure), and Google. Gartner says: “Data integration tools are seeing continued evolution, underpinned by customers’ maturity, stable sales growth and widespread adoption. The market grew at a rate of 9.8 percent in 2024, the same growth rate as in 2023, and reached a total volume of $5.9 billion.”
The top four vendors have 44.5 percent of the market. We understand the top four to be Salesforce’s Informatica, Microsoft with its Azure Data Factory/SSIS, IBM with DataStage, and Google with Data Integrator/GoldenGate. IBM’s position should strengthen next year as it is buying Confluent.
Gartner says the 9.8 percent market growth rate seen in 2024 is relaxing to an 8.1 percent CAGR for the 2024 to 2029 period. This is due to a convergence of standalone data management platforms which reduces the need for myriad point-to-point connectors. Fivetran CEO George Fraser says: “Enterprises are consolidating their data stacks and moving toward open, automated platforms that power AI.” So Fivetran is automating its pipelines and aiding the integration.”
Gartner says: “By 2027, AI assistants and AI-enhanced workflows incorporated into data integration tools will reduce manual intervention by 60 percent and enable self-service data management.”
Ravi Shankar, SVP and CMO at Denodo, says: “The goals of data integration are now driven by the need for AI-ready data, which is not only immediately integrated, but also governed, secure, and trusted, and the Denodo Platform, with its semantic capabilities and logical data management approach, provides the most flexible, direct paths to AI-ready data.”
Denodo has made Gartner’s Magic Quadrant for Data Integration Tools available here.
Bootnote
The “Magic Quadrant” is a 2D space defined by axes labeled “Ability To Execute” and “Completeness of Vision,” and split into four squares tagged “Visionaries” and “Niche Players” at the bottom, and “Challengers” and “Leaders” at the top. The best placed vendors are in the top right Leaders box and with a balance between execution ability and vision completion. The nearer they are to the top right corner of that box the better.
