Data is all the rage today. The Data Driven paradigm and the slogan “Data is new oil” are manifestations of a movement of interest that is of interest not only to those in the industry. This movement has been the driving force behind the flourishing of new organizational and technological models for managing data assets, first and foremost Data Fabric and Data Mesh.

Let’s try to clarify the principles, pillars, differences, and possible synergies between these two models, designed to address the challenges of modern data management: speed, volume, enhancement, reliability, compliance, presidium, heterogeneity, disambiguation, collaboration, participation, security, usability. The typical scenario faced by those approaching a company’s information assets is characterized by high fragmentation. IT solutions have often been purchased following logics based on punctual contingent needs, sometimes even on the hype of the moment, rather than on an organic and integrated view of information.

But a patchwork of many different tools, from different sources results in the proliferation of duplicate information, perhaps with distinct meanings and purposes; difficulty in identifying recognized ownership of the information domains present in the enterprise; increased complexity in fulfilling regulatory constraints; and the need to have to design information interchange models, which will have to be kept aligned with variations in individual sources.

These considerations lead to a reflection on the adequacy of current data management models, both on the level of technological architectures and on the organizational level. Welcome to the era of Modern Data Management.