Cinchy looks to end costly data integration within enterprises

For decades, enterprises have followed the practice of maintaining separate data stores for different applications (like AI and analytics) and leveraging data integrations – such as APIs, ETLs and reconciliations – to let apps interact with data limited to their counterparts.

These integrations seamlessly copy the information to enable access. But, as the volume of data and the number of applications continues to grow, managing the integrations is becoming a challenge. Each app can have multiple integrations, which can easily hit IT budgets and create complications around privacy and governance. Not to mention, different versions of data also add to the confusion.

Data collaboration > data integration

To address this problem of fragmentation and costly data integration, Toronto-based Cinchy offers a “dataware” platform. The company today announced it has raised $14.5 million in a series B round of funding.

Claimed to be the next tech revolution following hardware and software, Cinchy’s dataware enables collaboration with data instead of duplication. This basically means instead of keeping app data siloed and then using integrations to copy it for other apps, the platform allows apps to collaborate directly on the original data in real time by connecting it from all ends within a universal network-based architecture. It is pretty similar to how Google eliminated file copying with Drive and provides apps with instant visibility into data for faster time to market.

“It’s a category of technologies that enable organizations to free data from the applications used to create, store or analyze it, so they can better control their data and place it at the center of the IT architecture,” Dan DeMers, CEO and cofounder of Cinchy, previously told VentureBeat. “We’ve become accustomed to data-serving applications; this new breed of technologies flips that equation. Dataware offers greater business value in areas such as accelerating the delivery of digital solutions and enhancing business agility while providing stronger privacy controls.”

Leading giants, including TD Bank, National Bank, Colliers International, AIS and the YMCA, already use Cinchy dataware to set up fully autonomous data networks and eliminate dependence on costly, time-consuming data integrations. It also helps extend the ROI of legacy systems and SaaS apps, and enables teams with secure data self-service to generate and activate collaborative intelligence.

“Just as the advent of software decoupled function from hardware and enabled the birth of the modern computer, dataware decouples data from software to enable a new paradigm of application-independent data,” Joe Hilleary, senior analyst at Eckerson Group, noted.

Funding the future

With the latest round of funding, led by Forgepoint Capital, Cinchy plans to improve its product as well as grow its team and market footprint. The company says it will capitalize on the surge in global demand for data fabric and data mesh solutions designed to evolve the enterprise from obeying unruly application ecosystems to regaining full control of their data. 

“We’re thrilled to partner with the team at Forgepoint Capital, which uniquely appreciates the importance of data layer controls and the enablement of data autonomy,” DeMers said. “This latest round of funding enables us to further expand our team and release new offerings that include prebuilt dataware solutions designed to help organizations instantly liberate both trapped data and siloed SaaS applications.”

According to G2, Cinchy competes with data management providers such as Clearbit Data Activation Platform, Cleo Integration Cloud, Microsoft SQL Server and Zapier.

This latest round takes the company’s total fund raise close to $25 million.