ISG Software Research Analyst Perspectives

Why Data Software Providers Are Embracing Model Context Protocol

Posted by Matt Aslett on 19 November 2025

I have written several times this year about Model Context Protocol (MCP) and its importance in enabling agentic artificial intelligence (AI) use cases. Numerous data platform, data management, data operations and real-time data software providers have added support for MCP to their products in recent months. MCP has become so ubiquitous, in fact, that it is easy to forget the protocol was only... Read More

Topics: Governance, Operations, Analytics, Data Platforms, Generative AI, Data Intelligence, AI & Technologies, AI and Machine Learning, Streaming & Events

Neo4j Expands Data Platform for Graph Intelligence

Posted by Matt Aslett on 13 November 2025

I previously wrote about the importance of knowledge graphs to data intelligence and artificial intelligence (AI). A knowledge graph can surface information about the relationships and dependencies between virtual and physical objects by providing a structured representation of data that identifies the connections between entities and attributes. This representation of enterprise knowledge can be... Read More

Topics: Data Intelligence, AI & Technologies

InterSystems Addresses AI and Data Silos With Data Studio

Posted by Matt Aslett on 06 November 2025

As I recently explained, treating data as a business discipline—rather than a technical one—is a critical component of delivering competitive advantage through investment in data processing, analytics and artificial intelligence. As enterprises embrace data as a business discipline, it is increasingly important that the products used for data processing and management enable collaboration between... Read More

Topics: Analytics, Data Platforms, Data Intelligence, AI & Technologies

AI-Infused Data Management Is Still Evolving

Posted by Matt Aslett on 23 October 2025

I recently explained the significance of data management as an enabler of strategic adoption of artificial intelligence. Data management enables enterprises to ensure that data is valid, consistent and trusted for operational use cases and analytic decision-making. Large volumes of data are required to train models, making data management and data governance critical to AI. Data quality and data... Read More

Topics: Data Management, Generative AI, Data Intelligence, AI & Technologies

DataGalaxy Addresses the Governance and Value of Data

Posted by Matt Aslett on 16 October 2025

I previously wrote about the role that data intelligence catalogs play in enabling business leaders to understand the use of data across an enterprise. I also recently wrote about the importance of treating data as a business discipline to ensure that data projects are aligned with business strategy objectives. As I noted, although many data catalog products provide enterprises with information... Read More

Topics: Governance, AI & Technologies

The Evolving Data Product Platform Landscape

Posted by Matt Aslett on 23 September 2025

The emergence of natural language analytics interfaces driven by generative artificial intelligence (GenAI) models has accelerated enterprise initiatives to enable data democratization—making data available to business decision-makers without the need to train them to use business intelligence (BI) tools. It has also heightened the need for agreed semantic models and business metrics, as well as... Read More

Topics: Operations, Data Intelligence, AI & Technologies

Nextdata Provides a Platform for Distributed Data

Posted by Matt Aslett on 11 September 2025

I previously described data mesh as a cultural and organizational approach to distributed data ownership, access and governance, rather than a product that could be acquired or even a technical architecture that could be built. While that remains true, many data management software providers have adapted their products in recent years to address the four key principles of data mesh:... Read More

Topics: Operations, Data Intelligence, AI & Technologies

IBM Enhances Data Intelligence and Data Integration

Posted by Matt Aslett on 02 September 2025

I previously wrote about IBM’s strategy of consolidating analytics, data and artificial intelligence (AI) functionality from various products under its watsonx brand, which was launched in 2023 to address the AI development life cycle, as well as data storage processing and AI governance. The company has added two more offerings to its watsonx portfolio in recent months, combining established... Read More

Topics: Governance, Operations, Analytics, Data Platforms, Data Intelligence, AI & Technologies, AI and Machine Learning

Approaches to Data as a Business Discipline for AI

Posted by Matt Aslett on 27 August 2025

The IT department of any enterprise is integral to implementing and managing the execution of its data objectives, just as the finance department is integral to implementing and managing financial objectives. Few enterprises would allow the finance department complete autonomy to define financial strategies; however, too many enterprises allow the IT department to define data strategies. Treating... Read More

Topics: Governance, Operations, Analytics, Data Intelligence, AI & Technologies, AI and Machine Learning

Reltio Provides a Platform for AI-Driven Data Unification

Posted by Matt Aslett on 20 August 2025

Fragmentation is a pervasive problem for enterprises seeking to take advantage of data generated by various applications to drive business decision-making. For almost as long as the IT industry has existed enterprises have struggled to combine and integrate information from multiple data siloes created by a variety of applications and business units. Creating a “single version of the truth” that... Read More

Topics: Governance, Data Intelligence, AI & Technologies, AI and Machine Learning

Assessing AI Requirements for Operational Data Platforms

Posted by Matt Aslett on 12 August 2025

I have written several times recently about the importance of data in supporting artificial intelligence (AI), including generative AI (GenAI) and agentic AI. From a data platforms perspective, this is most evident in the role that analytic data platforms play in supporting the training and fine-tuning of AI models. Operational data platforms also have a role to play in supporting enterprise AI... Read More

Topics: AI, Data Platforms, AI & Technologies, Agentic AI

Adopt Real-Time Data Software to Operate at the Speed of Business

Posted by Matt Aslett on 06 August 2025

ISG Software Research recently published the 2025 Buyers Guide for Real-Time Data, providing an assessment of 43 software providers offering products used by analytics and data professionals to facilitate the use of real-time data. The Real-Time Data Buyers Guide research includes five reports which are focused on overall Real-Time Data, Application Integration, Messaging and Event Processing,... Read More

Topics: AI, Generative AI, AI & Technologies, Streaming & Events

Oracle Addresses Agentic AI for Fusion and Beyond

Posted by Matt Aslett on 29 July 2025

ISG Software Research’s expertise examines the software provider landscape through two lenses: business applications (including office of finance, human capital management (HCM) and customer experience) and IT and technology (including digital business, digital technology, artificial intelligence (AI) and analytics and data). Most software providers fall into one of these two high-level expertise... Read More

Topics: Analytics, AI, Data Platforms, IT & Technologies, AI & Technologies, AI and Machine Learning, Cloud Infrastructure

Confluent Address Unified Stream and Batch Processing with AI

Posted by Matt Aslett on 22 July 2025

I have been saying for several years that success with streaming data requires enterprises to manage data in motion alongside data at rest, rather than treating streaming as a niche activity. Software providers have also been moving in this direction. Many established data management providers have added the ability to manage, store and process streaming data alongside their existing batch data... Read More

Topics: Governance, AI, Data Platforms, AI & Technologies, AI and Machine Learning, Streaming & Events

Boomi Enables Data Management and Agentic AI

Posted by Matt Aslett on 03 July 2025

One of the key questions that will need to be solved if agentic artificial intelligence is to fulfill its potential is which technologies and providers will serve the role of orchestrating communication and integration between the various models, applications and data repositories involved. ISG Research defines agentic AI as software designed to execute business processes through autonomous... Read More

Topics: Governance, Operations, AI, Generative AI, Data Intelligence, AI & Technologies, AI and Machine Learning

The Unreasonable Effectiveness of Data Management

Posted by Matt Aslett on 01 July 2025

If a single phrase could sum up the big data craze of a dozen or so years ago, it would be “more data beats better algorithms.” Attributed to Google research director Peter Norvig, the quote effectively summarized a research paper Norvig jointly authored called The Unreasonable Effectiveness of Data and was embraced by big data enthusiasts as articulating the prevalent thinking that enterprises... Read More

Topics: Operations, AI, Data Intelligence, AI & Technologies, AI and Machine Learning

Solace Enables Agentic AI with Solace Platform

Posted by Matt Aslett on 25 June 2025

My colleagues have recently described how agentic artificial intelligence (AI) has the potential to revolutionize enterprise computing by automating the handling of static and dynamic complexity to enable software to take action without the need for human intervention. Put simply, agentic AI is the orchestration of the execution of discreet business tasks by a combination of software components... Read More

Topics: Governance, AI, Generative AI, AI & Technologies, AI and Machine Learning, Streaming & Events

Data Lakehouses Enable Data as a Product

Posted by Matt Aslett on 17 June 2025

I have previously described how data as a product was initially closely aligned with data mesh, a cultural and organizational approach to distributed data processing. As a result of data mesh’s association with distributed data, many assumed that the concept was diametrically opposed to the data lake, which offered a platform for combining large volumes of data from multiple data sources. That... Read More

Topics: Operations, Data Platforms, Data Intelligence, AI & Technologies

Salesforce Intention for Informatica Will Bolster AI and Data Efforts

Posted by Matt Aslett on 11 June 2025

I have previously explained how increased enterprise focus on artificial intelligence (AI) and agentic AI is a forcing function for enterprises to take long-overdue steps to improve data management and data governance. Data is integral to AI: large volumes of data are required to train models, while data freshness is important for inferencing in interactive applications and data quality is... Read More

Topics: Governance, Data Management, Generative AI, AI & Technologies, Agentic AI

Google Plots BigQuery Path from Data to AI

Posted by Matt Aslett on 03 June 2025

A little under a year ago, I explained how Google was positioning its BigQuery product as a unified data platform for processing data in multiple formats, across multiple locations, for multiple use cases—including business intelligence (BI) and artificial intelligence (AI)—using a combination of multiple data engines, including SQL, Spark and Python. The evolution of BigQuery as the focus of... Read More

Topics: Data Platforms, Generative AI, AI & Technologies