CXO CASE INSIGHT STUDY

What were the biggest challenges in driving the cultural and organisational change needed to move Informatica to a cloud-based model?

When we went private in 2015, a significant number of our customers had already started migrating their applications( which are the sources of most of the data they want to use), and it was only logical that they would also want to handle their data management in the cloud. As a result, the investment idea was that we could significantly increase the company’ s value by evolving into a genuine cloud- and subscription-based business.

The transformation we’ ve driven in pursuit of that goal has faced plenty of challenges. Every one of our products had to be redesigned as a cloud-first offering, while staying true to our history of being data-agnostic and supporting cloud, onpremises and hybrid environments alike. While the product team were focused on that effort, my team partnered with operations and strategy groups to completely reinvent our front- and backoffice systems and processes to power this new cloud-centric company. This has not just been an IT or sales shift – it’ s been a full-scale reinvention of the business. Change on that scale takes serious effort.

How did you build buy-in across the company for such a fundamental shift in the business model?

Actually, we had full commitment from both the board and the broader leadership team right from the get-go. I never had to stand up and pitch:“ Here’ s the plan, here’ s why it matters, and here’ s the price tag.” I was encouraged that our board were willing to start without pushing for a final cost estimate or even a firm time estimate. The change was large and would impact every function and the technology selections. Other decisions that would drive cost would be made incrementally. There was no way to know with any degree of accuracy at the beginning.

I also explained to the board that I couldn’ t predict how long the transformation would take, but I was certain it was the direction we needed to head to create a solid foundation for the future – and that we needed to start now. They backed that conviction wholeheartedly. Securing buy-in is often one of the toughest challenges for organisations, but thankfully it wasn’ t for us.

Another factor was that being privately owned( at that stage) gave us a huge advantage. We could execute the transformation away from the spotlight, without having to justify revenue swings or spending every quarter to public markets. That freedom allowed us to make decisions with a true long-term view and help cement our future leadership position as the foremost cloud-based data management platform provider.

How did you align IT strategy with the broader business strategy during Informatica’ s transformation?

It was all about connecting the move to the cloud with the success of the business. We made sure people knew that while we were implementing an entirely new architecture, the real aim was to establish a sustainable, cloud- and consumption-based business model. The architecture itself was simply the path to that goal.

We also made sure the transition was gradual. We designed the new operating framework from the ground up while still running the legacy business. We continued to manage our core licensing and maintenance operations while we overhauled everything else – from CRM and revenue recognition to reporting and customer success – to align with the new cloud-first operating model.

How do you ensure IT isn’ t just supporting the business but is also a driver of competitive advantage?

I talked earlier about how the new architecture wasn’ t the end game but the path to something bigger: building a sustainable cloud-based business model. And that’ s something we’ ve reached. Our cloud subscription annual recurring revenue( ARR) increased 28 % year-over-year in the second quarter of 2025 to US $ 901 million. The success of our cloud business over this time was a true cross functional effort across the company. I’ m proud of the part IT played in that transformation by delivering the process and technology capabilities required to operate a true cloud company at scale.

Can you share an example of how you reimagined a front- or back-office process to better support a subscription-driven cloud company?

One thing that changed hugely was the KPIs we used to evaluate the business. Under the old model, for instance, churn wasn’ t a top priority. In the cloud, churn is critical. Net retention rate and ARR also rose to prominence – new concepts for the entire organisation at the time.

Introducing new metrics meant we needed to establish a clear, agreed-upon definition for how they’ re calculated. That might sound straightforward, but it rarely is. Consider sales territories: we have many global customers who may have buying centres in different countries. If the majority of the selling effort happens in Europe but the approval and purchase agreement comes out of North America – where do you count that sale? As a leadership team, we had to work through these scenarios, settle on the rules, document them and then build these calculations directly into the data model so they can be used by multiple functions.

This process was beneficial for the entire organisation because it pushed us deeper into data governance – a space we obviously already knew well. These definitions had to be set at the highest levels of leadership.

What were the most significant hurdles in modernising legacy systems, and how did you overcome them?

One major hurdle I hadn’ t fully appreciated before we hit it, was that we were fundamentally changing how our employees did their work and that each person would face their own challenges with change at different times. I learned that no matter how

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