The main dilemma posed by enterprise data integration is made explicit by the phrase itself.
Enterprises, by nature, are flooded with data – often fragmented, distributed, and living in different formats or environments. Integrating such humongous data to make it more accessible and useful is considered a fundamental priority across business landscape.
Some time ago, this undertaking proved to be a mammoth task, promising to consume all sorts of time and resources. But fortunately, the introduction of modern technology such as data integration platform has greatly alleviated the strain and stress pertaining to such initiatives.
Here’s how enterprises are solving the challenges of enterprise data integration.
Enterprise Data Integration: Challenges and Solutions
Though circumstances may vary for different industries, there are some common hurdles faced by companies. Let’s explore the challenges and ways to explore them in detail.
Challenge 1: Large volume of data sources and types
It is certain that data can exist in all forms of formats, sources, and locations. Companies find it difficult to unify such large volume and variety of data with ease and precision. This challenge is coupled with other smaller hiccups like cleansing and deduplication to maintain quality.
Solution:Modern-day data integration solutions with large file data ingestion capability can help companies analyze and use large volumes of data for making informed decisions.These tools help with accomplishing the task at scale through automation.
Challenge 2: Integration can be a lengthy process
With changing customer expectations, speed is becoming all the more pertinent for a multitude of businesses. Integration project takes a lot of time, at times several months, in addition to enormous consumption, which can produce a lot of stress across the business spectrum.
Solution:With pre-built application connectors, shared templates, monitoring dashboard and more, modern data integration can easily increase time-to-value as opposed to traditional solutions.
Challenge 3:Large-scale integration can place a strain on the IT department
Enterprises are struggling with having enough resources, especially when it comes to technical experts. Not only does there tend to be a scarcity of qualified personnel, but there are also times when the available ones are forced to participate in less important operational activities – not to mention, sometimes work itself is often tedious and repetitive.
Solution:The best thing about modern-day data integration tools is that they can be used by non-technical experts. Features like drag-and-drop UI and reusable components reduce or even eliminate the need for manual coding. More so, the self-service approach empowers business users and helps them integrate without IT support.
Challenge 4: Security could become harder to manage
Enterprises are likely to face a number of security challenges that can hamper their operations. Actually, for data integration to be successful, meeting regulatory needs is necessary. Plus, if the customer data is not integrated properly and data access is not monitored accurately, then breaches almost become unavoidable.
Solution:Cutting-edge integration technologies place data security and compliance as their topmost priority. By maintaining an end-to-end encrypted environment, these tools ensure security while transferring and exchanging data with precision. The users are individually authorized and authenticated when they are registered before using the integration application to ensure security.