Andrew White

We finally published a note (see The Differences, and Similarities, between Operational MDM and Analytical MDM) that tries to get the bottom of this thorny issue.  It has taken a while, but it is worth it.  This should be “the” note that nails the key questions most users have asked over the last couple of [...]

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I blogged yesterday about two of the main use-cases of MDM: operational MDM and analytical MDM.  Mark Beyer and I would “argue” if there was a way to denote the primary difference of the two, with respect to governance.  I explained that in operational MDM, governance is “active” and in analytical MDM, governance is “passive”. [...]

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A few years ago we introduced the notion of MDM “use cases”.  After looking at hundreds of end user inquiries we spotted some patterns; some were clear and some were less.  One very clear pattern is what we called, “operational MDM”.  The common characteristics that describe this use case were (and still are):

identify erroneous master [...]

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I spoke with an end user the other day that had a pretty forward looking strategy as it related to MDM, and specifically MDM of Product Data.  When we talk about MDM of Product Data, there are assumptions that we all make – and these might be different.  Is MDM of Product Data a sell-side [...]

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I had one of those client calls today that brought into sharp focus something that had avoided such clarity.  Many of us have known that MDM and BI have a relationship; some mistakenly associate the two as if they are alternatives: I have heard some even think that MDM “needs” BI.  But, the reality is [...]

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Well that was a fun week.  I just had a week without travel (always a pleasure) where I spend most of the time on the telephone with users, or doing research.  And this week was important because we are wrapping up our preparations for our up coming Gartner MDM Summit, 2009, in Los Angeles, October [...]

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I spied an interesting article last week in the InfoManagement blogs.   It was, MDM Data Quality as a Process, by Jim Ericson.  I thought it was interesting for a couple of reasons.  I thought the title was hinting at a ruse: is MDM the same as data quality?  Does data quality that is oriented as a [...]

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It is not in my nature to use blogs to argue of topics that require detailed exchange of information and analysis…but the following article was brought to my attention and I thought it a potentially good example of “vendor hype” even it was not directly provided by the vendor.  
Andy Hayler, CEO, The Information Difference, wrote [...]

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This week I had the pleasure of spending time with two end user organizations that helped me draw out some important considerations.  Company A was very much a large, global concern who’s product is very much information rich, selling to consumer (B2C) and commercial organizations (B2B).  Company B was another large, global concern, who’s product [...]

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I took a briefing from Orchestra Networks yesterday, a French based MDM vendor, that allowed me to explore again the comparison between the idea of what a best-of-breed or specialist MDM vendor can do versus a generalist MDM vendor.  Of course, the answer is in how these vendor categories are defined.  And once we have [...]

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