Salesforce finally bags Informatica to bolster AI push

After more than a year of trying, Salesforce announced today it is buying data management company Informatica for $8 billion. The purchase will bolster the CRM giant’s push into AI. 

It will also boost Salesforce’s portfolio in data management and governance, aiming to “deploy powerful and responsible agentic AI.”

“Truly autonomous, trustworthy AI agents need the most comprehensive understanding of their data,” Salesforce president and CTO Steve Fisher said in a statement. “The combination of Informatica’s capabilities with Salesforce’s Agentforce platform “delivers exactly this.”

Dig deeper: Salesforce Agentforce: What you need to know

Adding Informatica’s data catalog, integration, governance, privacy and data management services to Salesforce’s Data Cloud, MuleSoft and Tableau products will provide a “unified architecture for agentic AI,” said Salesforce CEO Marc Benioff. It will “enable autonomous agents to deliver smarter, safer, and more scalable outcomes for every company.” 

Informatica, founded in 1993, helps companies manage and analyze data across systems in the cloud and on-site. Its customers include companies ranging from Unilever to Toyota. Informatica was taken private in 2015 and went public again in 2021. 

Salesforce was one of several other companies trying to buy Informatica. Discussions last year about a deal with the CRM giant fell apart over terms, and at that time, the potential valuation was closer to $10 billion.

The deal is Salesforce’s largest since it bought Slack in 2021 for $28 billion.