THE FUTURE OF DATA ARCHITECTURE

HAS THE DATA WAREHOUSE HAD ITS DAY?

TOPICAL SURVEY

Authors This study was prepared by BARC, an independent

Jacqueline Bloemen market analyst firm. It is available free of charge
Timm Grosser thanks to the generosity of Databricks, Denodo,
Precisely and TimeXtender.
CONTENTS

Foreword...................................................................................................................................................................................... 3

Management summary.............................................................................................................................................................. 4

Data & analytics users are surprisingly patient...................................................................................................................... 7

Business user empowerment is about far more than self-service dashboards................................................................. 9

Business domain experts must take responsibility for data products.............................................................................. 11

Centralized data architecture concepts have served their time......................................................................................... 13

Evolving a data culture is about people, not just buying technology................................................................................. 15

Demographics........................................................................................................................................................................... 17

BARC profile.............................................................................................................................................................................. 19

Sponsor profiles...................................................................................................................................................................... 20

Authors...................................................................................................................................................................................... 24

The Future of Data Architecture - © BARC 2022 2

 FOREWORD

Data architecture is a topic that is as relevant today as ever. It is widely their detail. However, is this best practice, which has basically lasted for
regarded as a matter for data engineers, not business domain experts. three decades, still suitable for meeting the challenges of the increasingly
But is it really? Statements from countless interviews with our customers distributed data landscapes of today’s digital enterprises?
reveal that the data warehouse is seen as a “black box” by many and
understood by few business users. Therefore, it is not clear why the costly Our survey results show that the opinions of different roles in the
and apparently flexibility-inhibiting data warehouse is needed at all. We organization differ considerably in many cases. It is primarily the data &
even know companies that are cutting back their investments in a “single analytics experts in the central teams who adhere to the central approach.
point of truth” for these reasons. They see it as proven and successful.

Participants around the world were surveyed, with most responses Among executives and managers, as well as process and data & analytics
coming from Europe. We examined the current architecture approaches experts in business units, the picture is often different. The question arises:
of companies of different sizes from various industries. Participants were Should future data architecture be determined more centrally from the
asked to rate the skills and competencies in the handling of data in their perspective of data engineers or more decentrally from the perspective of
company compared to their main competitors. This allowed us to gain an domain experts? Or is a federated approach the best way forward?
understanding of how “best-in-class” companies are shaping their data
architecture in comparison to “laggards” (see demographics). We hope that our survey results will provide you with valuable insights and
help you find the right solution for the future design of your company’s
In general, central data & analytics teams determine the data architecture data landscape. We welcome your feedback at any time.
for analytical data, decoupled from the landscape of operational data
sources. Our survey shows that they continue to pursue clearly centralized
architecture concepts. Indeed, this is what the data warehouse, data lake Jacqueline Bloemen and Timm Grosser
and data lakehouse have in common, regardless of the differences in Würzburg, August 2022
 MANAGEMENT SUMMARY

01 DATA & ANALYTICS USERS ARE

RECOMMENDATION
SURPRISINGLY PATIENT
At first glance, users appear to be quite satisfied with their existing data The most important measure in favor of better data utilization is to
landscape. But in fact, line-of-business managers and team members tend create transparency. The data landscape of most companies is complex.
to be more critical about the future viability of their data landscape than the Business users are already confronted with this issue today, despite
data & analytics experts in central teams. They are frequently dissatisfied with the data warehouse. This will not change with a new platform or a new
flexibility and extensibility and also criticize the lack of comprehensibility. Both architecture. Help is required to navigate this complexity. At the same
executives and business users say that existing data is hard to find. All groups time, central data & analytics teams must gain more insight into the
agree that existing analyses are not easy for business consumers to understand. concerns and needs of business users.

02 BUSINESS USER EMPOWERMENT MUST

RECOMMENDATION
FINALLY GAIN MOMENTUM
Providing self-service analytics tools to the business has picked up speed. Only Best-in-class companies realize that it is important to invest in enabling
a minority finds that the tools available to them are too technical. The limiting business users to work with data as and when required. For selected
factor is rather the data landscape. Because data warehouses frequently do data experts in the business, this will include data preparation. They
not meet business needs, data for analysis must be tediously gathered from already do this, but with inappropriate support, for example, in
various sources. Nevertheless, initiatives in the direction of a data catalog spreadsheets and without the right data documentation. Central data &
including suitable data documentation and self-service data preparation are analytics teams must embrace this reality and shape it more consciously
not widespread. in the future.

The Future of Data Architecture - © BARC 2022 4

 MANAGEMENT SUMMARY

03 BUSINESS DOMAIN EXPERTS MUST TAKE

RECOMMENDATION
RESPONSIBILITY FOR DATA PRODUCTS
Investments in data must deliver business value. Business domain Creating useful and understandable data & analytics products that deliver
expertise is required to assess where this is appropriate and how it business value requires business domain expertise. While central data &
should look. Plan for a gradual transformation, because it goes hand in analytics teams have very strong technology and data engineering knowledge,
hand with a cultural change and learning process. Central data teams their business domain expertise is not so strong. This is why there is an urgent
become advisors to the business, provide support with their technology need for business domain experts to take responsibility for data products.
and data engineering expertise and consult on central data governance This should not be limited to analytical data products but must include source-
issues. system-oriented data products that provide the original source data as well.

04 CENTRALIZED DATA ARCHITECTURE

RECOMMENDATION
CONCEPTS HAVE SERVED THEIR TIME
As the quantity and volume of distributed data sources increase, data Most companies continue to apply tried-and-tested concepts such as the data
architecture concepts that are exclusively centrally oriented quickly warehouse design paradigm when redesigning their data landscape. Best-in-
reach their limits. Therefore, design your future data architecture with class companies favor the data lakehouse approach. However, executives and
extended capabilities. Work towards a federated overall architecture business users in particular criticize the fact that centralized approaches cannot
in which data virtualization and distributed data pipelining and prevent the emergence of further data silos.
orchestration are options and create the framework for this. But there are also signs of a change in thinking. Companies are seeking to
improve their source data to streamline their data pipelines and to build a
better basis for data virtualization.

The Future of Data Architecture - © BARC 2022 5

 MANAGEMENT SUMMARY

05 EVOLVING A DATA CULTURE IS ABOUT

PEOPLE, NOT JUST BUYING TECHNOLOGY RECOMMENDATION

Companies are aware that organizational measures are needed above all to Establishing a data culture is a long-term process. It requires a change
further develop their data culture. But in practice, only a minority is implementing in mindset and a willingness to look outside the box. You need to bring
such measures. Initiatives that support self-service analytics are the most data producers and consumers together to enable the exchange of
widespread. This is good, but not enough. Strengthening cross-domain data perspectives and objectives. Technology such as a data catalog can
collaboration requires both harmonized master and reference data, and an effectively support data collaboration. But it is ultimately the business
understandable and shared view of data regardless of system silos. users who, through their contributions, bring the technology to life. It
This can only be achieved if business process owners and experts, the data takes cross-domain collaboration to find the right measures to improve
producers, are actively involved. the data landscape.

The Future of Data Architecture - © BARC 2022 6

01 DATA & ANALYTICS USERS ARE SURPRISINGLY
PATIENT
CORPORATE DATA LANDSCAPES ARE ONLY MODERATELY SUCCESSFUL
"Somewhat satisfied" and "very satisfied" here. Interestingly, some of the points with the
highest satisfaction ratings are also included
Query performance 57% here (‘flexibility with respect to extended data
Implementation and maintenance costs 56% requirements’ and ‘extensibility with respect to
advanced analytics requirements’). Satisfaction
Comprehensibility of the individual 55%
data models levels with ‘extensibility with respect to real/
Data pipeline performance 54% near-time requirements’ and ‘integratability of
semi-structured, complex or unstructured data’
Flexibility with respect to extended data 54%
requirements were below average. This reflects the fact that
Extensibility with respect to advanced 50% established data landscapes tend to struggle
analytics requirements
with advanced requirements that traditional
To what degree are you satisfied with the current data & analytics landscape in your company with regard to the architectures were originally not designed for .
following aspects? Top 6 satisfied (n=258)

When asked about the degree of satisfaction with

"Somewhat dissatisfied" and "very dissatisfied"
the data & analytics landscape in their companies,
survey participants were predominantly positive. Extensibility with respect to real/near-time requirements 31%
For six of the twelve points we asked about,
Integratability of semi-structured, complex or 29%
more than 50 percent said they were “somewhat unstructured data
satisfied” or “very satisfied”. It is worth noting, Simplicity and flexibility in searching, finding and using data 28%
however, that the proportion of “very satisfied”
Flexibility with respect to extended data requirements 28%
users is mostly between 10 and 15 percent .
Comprehensibility of the data landscape/architecture 25%
as a whole
The six highest dissatisfaction ratings range Extensibility with respect to advanced analytics requirements 24%
from 24 and 31 percent, with the proportion of
To what degree are you satisfied with the current data & analytics landscape in your company with regard to the
“somewhat satisfied” ratings also predominating
following aspects? Top 6 dissatisfied (n=258)

The Future of Data Architecture - © BARC 2022 7

01 DATA & ANALYTICS USERS ARE SURPRISINGLY
PATIENT
BUSINESS USERS ATTEST TO LACK OF FLEXIBILITY, EXTENSIBILITY AND COMPREHENSIBILITY
Closer analysis reveals, however, that the satis-
Percentage of "somewhat dissatisfied" and "very dissatisfied"
faction picture is somewhat deceptive. Line-of-
business managers and process experts tend to be Flexibility with respect to extended 26% 30% 32%
more critical about the future viability of the data data requirements
landscape than data & analytics experts in central 25% 38% 41%
Extensibility with respect to
teams. The latter are convinced of their ability to real/near-time requirements
23% 27% 38%
solve new challenges with existing resources, but Extensibility with respect to
business users are less satisfied. 41 percent of all advanced analytics requirement
18% 33% 39%
participants cite IT’s lack of speed in implementing Comprehensibility of the data
landscape/architecture as a whole
new requirements as a major challenge for users
of the data landscape, with the proportion even Data & analytics Data & analytics experts Managers/process experts
higher among business users at 48 percent. competence centers in business units in business units
To what degree are you satisfied with the current data & analytics landscape in your company with regard to the fol-
Especially worth mentioning is the lack of lowing aspects? Dissatisfied by role (n=258)

comprehensibility of the data landscape and

Percentage of "mostly agree" and "strongly agree"
architecture as a whole. Only 18 percent of data
& analytics experts in central teams see cause for 51% 57% 61% 73%
Existing data and analysesare not easily
dissatisfaction here, compared with 33 percent of understood by business consumers
data experts and 39 percent of process experts 42% 50% 59% 77%
in the business. When asked directly about the Existing data is hard to find
challenges in finding and understanding data and Data & analytics Data & analytics experts Managers/process Executives/C-Level
analyses, the dissatisfaction is even more evident, competence centers in business units experts in business
as the following graphic illustrates. The problem units
has not gone unnoticed at management level To what extent do you agree with the following statements regarding the data & analytics landscape in your company?
either. Agree by role (n=259)

The Future of Data Architecture - © BARC 2022 8

02 BUSINESS USER EMPOWERMENT IS ABOUT FAR
MORE THAN SELF-SERVICE DASHBOARDS
THE ANALYSIS TOOLS ARE NOT THE LIMITING FACTOR, BUT RATHER THE DATA LANDSCAPE
Distributed data sources and the tedious collection
Business users cannot implement new requirements themselves
48% and preparation of this data is an annoying issue
Data for analyses must be tediously gathered from various sources for users (43 percent). For participants from
43%
best-in-class companies, this even tops the list of
IT cannot react quickly enough to new requirements
41% user problems at 38 percent. Overall, the level of
Data landscape is difficult to understand agreement across the business is particularly high:
37% 45 percent of executives, 51 percent of business
A lack of technical support and data management personnel data experts and 61 percent of business managers
37%
and process experts share this view, compared to
Data warehouse/data lake does not cover our requirements
30% only 33 percent of central data & analytics experts.
Tools are too technical This should come as no surprise as it is among
24%
the primary responsibilities of this latter group
Other
3% of experts to have a good overview of the data
No challenges landscape. Furthermore, they are generally the
3% ones who implement the central analytical data
What challenges do data users in your company face? (n=260) sets, such as data warehouses or data lakes.

Self-service analytics has been a trend for some introducing analytics tools suitable for business While these centralized data repositories seem
years, and this survey underpins its importance. users or plan to do so. Strikingly, only 24 percent to work well at first glance, almost one in three
The fact that business users cannot implement actually find that existing tools are too technical. respondents finds that data warehouses and
new requirements themselves is regarded as the Even though line-of-business data & analytics data lakes do not cover their requirements.
top challenge data users are facing (48 percent). experts in particular agree with this point (35 Dissatisfaction is even greater among business
At 53 percent, this opinion is particularly strong percent), all other persona groups concur to a managers and process experts. 43 percent of
within central data & analytics teams. In line lesser degree. So, the tool issue does not seem to these personas believe that the data warehouse/
with this finding, 74 percent are either already be all that important. data lake does not meet their requirements.

The Future of Data Architecture - © BARC 2022 9

02 BUSINESS USER EMPOWERMENT IS ABOUT FAR
MORE THAN SELF-SERVICE DASHBOARDS
FINDING DATA, UNDERSTANDING IT AND PREPARING IT APPROPRIATELY IS THE CENTRAL
CHALLENGE
71 percent of our survey participants find it impor- Giving business users more freedom
tant to give business users more freedom in the in the use of data & analytics 29% 42% 25% 4
use of data & analytics. Although only 29 percent
Introducing analytics tools suitable
of companies are currently implementing this, a for business users 29% 45% 20% 6%
further 42 percent are planning to do so.
Providing understandable documentation
and navigation assistance for data
22% 37% 34% 7%
This seems to be reflected in simplified data
Introducing data preparation tools
access. 59 percent of all respondents strongly suitable for business users
18% 30% 39% 13%
or mostly disagree with the statement that it is
Relevant and Relevant and Relevant but Of little or
difficult to get access to existing data. A contrary no relevance
being done planned not planned
view, however, can be found among executives as
well as managers and process experts in lines of How relevant are the following business-related/organizational measures for your company? (n=253)
business, where a majority actually feels strongly
relevant, 83 percent of which are already imple- Introducing data preparation tools suitable for
or predominantly restricted (57 and 52 percent
menting it or have plans to do so. business users seems to be even less relevant.
respectively).
For 13 percent of the companies surveyed, this
It is surprising, however, that the introduction measure has no relevance, and for another
Yet progress seems half-hearted. Despite the
of a data catalog and/or metadata management 39 percent it is relevant but not planned. It is
challenges of finding and understanding data and
is planned by only 28 percent. At 37 percent, interesting to note that a surprisingly high 41
analytics, only 22 percent are currently providing
the figure is somewhat higher for central data & percent of managers and process experts state
understandable documentation and navigation
analytics teams. This suggests that such initiatives that this measure is already being implemented
assistance. 34 percent have no plans to do this
are rather technically driven and therefore may at their company. It has very high relevance
even though they consider it relevant. The picture
not be appreciated or considered less useful by (90 percent) for best-in-class companies, with 74
is very different in best-in-class companies. A clear
business users. percent already implementing it or planning to do
100 percent of them consider this measure to be
so.

The Future of Data Architecture - © BARC 2022 10

03 BUSINESS DOMAIN EXPERTS MUST TAKE
RESPONSIBILITY FOR DATA PRODUCTS
CREATING ASSETS WITH BUSINESS VALUE REQUIRES DOMAIN EXPERTISE
It is therefore not surprising that putting
Business domains have no consumer requirements at the center of data &
data responsibility 14% 51% 24% 12%
analytics developments is a relevant measure for
Business domain expertise in IT/data 92 percent of survey respondents. So far, only 28
& analytics teams is insufficient 15% 38% 34% 20%13%
percent have implemented this measure , while
Strongly agree Mostly agree Mostly disagree Strongly disagree a further 41 percent plan to do so. Despite its
relevance, 24 percent have no plans to implement
To what extent do you agree with the following statements regarding the data & analytics landscape in your company? it at all. Best-in-class companies are particularly
(n=259)
active in this area (95 percent are implementing
It is common to bundle responsibility for data & analytics applications cover requirements, the or planning to do so).
analytics assets in central teams, which are often contrary is the case for executives and line-of-
located in IT. 53 percent of survey participants business respondents.
strongly or mostly agree that business domains
have no data responsibility. However, these Percentage of "mostly agree" and "strongly agree"
central teams lack business domain expertise (65
32% 44% 70%
percent agree). Consensus is even higher among Implemented data & analytics applications
executives (80 percent) and business managers do not cover our requirements
and process experts (73 percent). Existing data is not suitable 36% 43% 52%
for the necessary analyses
Lack of domain expertise generates a risk to
the quality of results. While more than two in Data & analytics Data & analytics experts Managers/process experts
competence centers in business units in business units
three data experts in central teams believe that
the existing data is well suited for analyses and
To what extent do you agree with the following statements regarding the data & analytics landscape in your company?
By role (n=259)

The Future of Data Architecture - © BARC 2022 11

03 BUSINESS DOMAIN EXPERTS MUST TAKE
RESPONSIBILITY FOR DATA PRODUCTS
MORE DECENTRALIZED OWNERSHIP OF DATA PRODUCTS IS NEEDED
To improve the quality of data & analytics assets, a top priority: 50 percent of these personas are
they must be treated as products whose success planning such initiatives.
is ultimately measured by the satisfaction of their
consumers. An obvious solution would be to place
90% In fact, decentralization and distribution of domain-
believe establishing domain-oriented
the responsibility in the hands of subject matter oriented data responsibility to the people who are
ownership of data products is a relevant
experts. 91 percent see this as a relevant measure, closest to the data and the principle of data as
measure.
and 63 percent are already implementing it or a product are central pillars of one of the latest
plan to do so. trends in the data & analytics marketspace: data
However, the crucial factor for successful work with Despite its importance, more than one in three mesh. Interestingly, only 22 percent believe that
data is its quality, which is determined first and organizations (35 percent) has not yet planned data mesh is a concept that will be important for
foremost in the operational business processes. any corresponding measures. Among laggards, their future data & analytics landscape, although
This opinion is shared by a clear majority of the figure is as high as 60 percent. This makes it the percentage is higher among data & analytics
respondents. 92 percent consider it important to one of the top two measures that companies are experts in the line of business (32 percent).
establish responsibility for data production and having the most difficulty implementing. Many
consumption in the business domains. executives have recognized this and are making it

Putting consumer requirements at the

center of data & analytics developments 28% 40% 24%
20% 8%

Placing the creation of data & analytics

products more in the hands of subject 20% 43% 28% 10%
matter experts

Relevant and Relevant and Relevant but Of little or

being done planned not planned no relevance

How relevant are the following business-related/organizational measures for your company? (n=253)

The Future of Data Architecture - © BARC 2022 12

04 CENTRALIZED DATA ARCHITECTURE CONCEPTS
HAVE SERVED THEIR TIME
MOST MODERNIZATION EFFORTS FOLLOW OLD CONCEPTS
Best-in-class companies in particular use the data
Optimization of existing data models, data processes, queries 56%
lakehouse concept. In this group, it is the most
Migration to a cloud platform for data & analytics 49% popular data architecture approach (40 percent),
followed by document modeling (36 percent). The
Improving the quality of source data and/or data interfaces 43%
data vault concept is also much more popular with
Redesign of the data architecture 43% these companies (31 percent versus 15 percent on
average).
Software and/or hardware modernization 37%

Which of these approaches to modernizing your data landscape are planned in your company? (n=260)
Data lakehouse 40%
The identified shortcomings in established data & Improving source data and redesigning the 28%
analytics landscapes as well as the limited ability data architecture are also popular measures. 36%
Document modeling 27%
to respond to new requirements show a need Interestingly, the majority still relies on the
for action. Companies are therefore planning to data warehouse as a design paradigm. Among 31%
Data vault modeling
modernize their landscapes. The most common laggards, the figure is as high as 64 percent. The 15%
approach is to optimize existing data models, popularity of the approaches overall indicates that
Best-in-class (BIC)
data processes and queries. Among best-in-class the redesign is largely taking place with tried-and- All
companies, as many as 60 percent have chosen tested concepts including dimensional modeling
this approach. Not surprisingly, the second most and frequently adding a data lake. Which data architecture and data modeling aproaches
will be important for your future data & analytics
popular modernization measure is migration to
landscape? (all: n=260; BIC: n=78)
the cloud.

The Future of Data Architecture - © BARC 2022 13

04 CENTRALIZED DATA ARCHITECTURE CONCEPTS
HAVE SERVED THEIR TIME
THERE IS A NEED TO EVOLVE FROM CENTRALIZED TO FEDERATED DATA ARCHITECTURE
be more realistic to implement a logical data
Distributed data is not easily linkable 38% warehouse in some areas in the future. At present,
only 18 percent consider this to be an important
Lack of willingness to invest in the quality of source data 37%
concept although best-in-class companies see
Data protection/privacy must be implemented
across multiple physical datasets 35% greater potential (26 percent). Experience shows
that in most cases it is not feasible to make all
Centralized data architecture cannot prevent data silos 35%
corporate data available in a single central data
Existing single point of truth concept generates
data redundancies that are difficult to manage 31% repository. The growing number of distributed
data sources and the increasing volumes of data
What are the current and future architectural challenges in your data & analytics landscape? (n=260) make this even more obvious. Accordingly, stream
Although best-in-class companies apply different Therefore, improving data sources is rightly a top processing (36 percent) and distributed data
principles to the redesign of their data landscapes, priority. This can also help with better linkability, pipelining & orchestration (29 percent) are the
a central data architecture is still the goal for most which is an important requirement for fast access most important concepts for the future from the
respondents. Only 13 percent opted for an open to new data sources and the successful use of best-in-class point of view.
data architecture for the future. data virtualization. With these measures, it would

But there are good reasons to question the Open stream processing solutions 36%
central concept. While only 31 percent of experts
in central teams are convinced that a centralized Distributed data pipelining & orchestration 29%
data architecture cannot prevent data silos, the
Cloud-provider-specific services 29%
corresponding figure is 43 percent at executive
level and 40 percent within IT. At the same time, Improved data sources and / or their interfaces 29%
data users in the business (42 percent) an are Best-in-class (BIC)
particularly aware of the fact that distributed data
is not easily linkable. Which concepts and technologies will be important for your future data & analytics landscape? By BIC (n=79)

The Future of Data Architecture - © BARC 2022 14

05 EVOLVING A DATA CULTURE IS ABOUT PEOPLE,
NOT JUST BUYING TECHNOLOGY
DATA COLLABORATION REQUIRES TARGETED ACTION
Organizations are aware that becoming a Companies are mainly prioritizing improvements
for the benefit of data consumers (top 3 being
93%
data-driven enterprise entails far more than
architectural and technological measures. A done). Measures that are instrumental in the
majority (63 percent) is either implementing overarching use of data and thus in breaking of organizations require more data
business-related/organizational measures or has down both data and departmental silos appear documentation,
to be important but are frequently not a priority.
28%
plans to do so. However, there is also a remarkable
proportion of companies that consider certain Harmonizing master and reference data is but only
measures to be relevant but have no plans to relevant for 92 percent of respondents, but 30 have plans for a data catalog.
address them. percent have no plans to do so.

To enable cross-divisional data collaboration, prerequisite for both, with the proportion in the
the data must be understandable. 93 percent central data teams being somewhat higher (23

92% find it relevant to provide understandable percent). This may also be the reason why only
On average documentation and navigation assistance for 28 percent plan to introduce a data catalog and/
of respondents believe business-related/ data. Especially business managers and process or metadata solution. Interestingly, in companies
organizational measures are relevant to experts (55 percent) demand making all relevant where tools are too technical, business users
improve data & analytics utilization. data sources searchable and accessible. cannot implement new requirements themselves
or IT cannot react quickly enough to new
Only a few (17 percent) are aware that an requirements, this measure is taken much more
overarching semantic data layer is actually a frequently (by 44, 53 and 58 percent respectively).

The Future of Data Architecture - © BARC 2022 15

05 EVOLVING A DATA CULTURE IS ABOUT PEOPLE,
NOT JUST BUYING TECHNOLOGY
DATA CULTURE DOES NOT ONLY CONCERN DATA CONSUMERS
Interestingly, there is reportedly no lack of
31% 74%
Harmonization of data difficult to implement management support. Only 24 percent of
from an organizational/business point of view
respondents say this would be a problem.
46% 65%
Lack of competencies/skills/experience However, many executives see it differently, with
in the business team 40 percent judging the sluggish modernization of
46% 52% the data landscape it to be a priority issue. And yet
Requirements of business consumers
not clear enough it would be precisely in their power to change this.
46% 52%
Lack of business ownership for data products
The modernization of the data landscape requires
32% 48% business departments to take more responsibility
Lack of competencies/skills/experience
in technical team as well as a greater focus on improving and
29% 48% harmonizing the source data. As many as 69
Communication barrier between
business and IT percent of respondents are working on improving
All Managers/process experts in business units data sharing across different business domains
and 63 percent are committed to harmonizing
What challenges have you experienced in implementing these approaches and measures? Top 6 by role (n=259) master and reference data and placing the
creation of data & analytics products in the hands
The organizational measures required to achieve About one in two in this group claim that there is a
of business users. Obviously, these tasks require a
a new culture in dealing with data pose challenges lack of willingness to invest in the quality of source
sound level of competencies and skills within the
to many companies. In fact, managers and process data and to optimize the data landscape (48 and
business paired with a clear vision of the business
experts in business units have a much clearer 52 percent respectively). 74 percent believe that
goals that data activities are intended to support.
view of these than all other users. And they see data harmonization is important but difficult to
To achieve this, the change in dealing with data
themselves as being primarily responsible. implement from a business and organizational
must be a top priority.
perspective. In this group, this is the most
frequently cited challenge.

The Future of Data Architecture - © BARC 2022 16

 DEMOGRAPHICS

BROAD SPECTRUM OF INDUSTRIES AND POSITION IN THE COMPANY INDUSTRY SECTOR

COMPANY SIZES
This study was based on the findings of a world- Data & analytics competence center Industry
wide online survey conducted in March and April 37% 26%
2022. The survey was promoted within the BARC Executive/C-Level Services
17% 22%
panel, as well as via websites and newsletter
Data & analytics expert in business unit Public sector
distribution lists. A total of 268 people took part, 17%
17%
representing a variety of different roles, industries
Manager/developer in IT IT
and company sizes. 13% 13%
Manager/consumer in business unit Banking and finance
8% 12%
External consultant or software vendor Retail/Wholesale/Trade
7% 9%

Other Other
REGION 4% 2%

Europe What is your role in the company? (n=260) Which of the following best describes your
52% organization’s industry sector? (n=260)
North America COMPANY SIZE
35%
Asia and Pacific Less than 500
8% 30%
South America 500 - 4,999
3% 39%
Africa 5,000 or more
2% 31%

In which region are you located? (n=260) How many employees does your company have?
(n=260)

The Future of Data Architecture - © BARC 2022 17

BEST-IN-CLASS

We divided the sample into “best-in-class” and

Much better “laggards” in order to identify differences in
17% terms of the current data culture within
organizations, the hurdles companies are
Slightly better
facing and the initiatives that are underway.
28%
This division was made based on the question
Similar “How would you rate your company’s data
40% culture compared to your main competitors?”.
Companies that have a much better data
Slightly worse
culture than their competitors are referred
13%
to as “best-in-class” (17 percent) while those
Much worse who have a slightly or much worse data
2% culture than their competitors are classed as
“laggards” (15 percent).
How would you rate your company’s data culture compared to your main competitors? (n=253)

The Future of Data Architecture - © BARC 2022 18

 BARC – MAKING DIGITAL LEADERS

BARC – BUSINESS APPLICATION

RESEARCH CENTER

BARC (Business Application Research Center) is Our independent research brings market
one of Europe’s leading analyst firms for business developments into clear focus, puts software and
software, focusing on the areas of data, business vendors through their paces and gives users a
intelligence (BI) and analytics, enterprise content place to express their opinions. BARC GmbH
Berliner Platz 7
management (ECM), customer relationship
Events D-97080 Würzburg
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Decision-makers and IT industry leaders come Germany
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 SPONSOR PROFILE: DATABRICKS

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 SPONSOR PROFILE: DENODO

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 SPONSOR PROFILE: PRECISELY

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 SPONSOR PROFILE: TIMEXTENDER

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The Future of Data Architecture - © BARC 2022 23

 AUTHORS

JACQUELINE BLOEMEN TIMM GROSSER

SENIOR ANALYST SENIOR ANALYST

Jacqueline Bloemen is a senior analyst with a As a senior analyst, Timm Grosser has been
major focus on data & analytics strategy and advising domestic and international companies
culture, architecture and technology, governance of various sizes and industries in the areas of
and organization. She is an author and speaker BI, data management and analytics for more
and has been advising companies of various than 10 years. During his time as a consultant,
sizes and industries for over 35 years. Currently, he has designed numerous solutions in BI/big
her research and consulting activities focus on data strategy, organization, architecture and
the transformation to becoming a data-driven tool selection with customers and in the BARC
company. test lab. He is a frequent speaker at conferences
and seminars as well as the author of numerous
industry articles and market studies.

The Future of Data Architecture - © BARC 2022 24

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