How Salesforce’s $8bn Informatica acquisition completes its AI data infrastructure play

Salesforce, the global leader in AI-powered customer relationship management, announced on May 27, 2025, that it had entered into a definitive agreement to acquire enterprise cloud data management firm Informatica in an all-cash transaction valued at approximately $8 billion. The equity value is net of Salesforce’s current holdings in Informatica, and shareholders of Informatica’s Class A and Class B-1 shares will receive $25 in cash per share. This acquisition represents one of Salesforce’s most significant strategic moves in recent years as it seeks to transform its data infrastructure to power next-generation agentic AI applications across the enterprise.

Positioned squarely at the intersection of enterprise data and artificial intelligence, the Informatica acquisition is meant to embed robust data transparency, governance, and contextual understanding directly into the Salesforce ecosystem. Informatica brings with it a mature platform of data integration, metadata management, master data management (MDM), quality, and privacy tools — capabilities that will now be unified with Salesforce’s Data Cloud, MuleSoft, Tableau, and Agentforce platforms.

What Will Informatica Add to Salesforce’s Data Cloud Strategy?

Informatica is best known for helping enterprises create clear, governed, and actionable data environments across multi-cloud and hybrid infrastructures. Its metadata-driven architecture and policy-first design principles are foundational to building compliant, high-trust AI systems. The acquisition will allow Salesforce to deepen its control over data lineage, standardization, and contextual metadata — a necessity for any company that wants to operate scalable and explainable AI agents.

By integrating Informatica, Salesforce intends to transform its Data Cloud into not just a unified Customer Data Platform (CDP), but a source of truth that underpins every AI-driven interaction across the organization. Informatica’s tooling will allow for more complete data harmonization, clarity of source and transformation, and enriched data context — all of which are vital for enabling AI agents to function autonomously yet safely.

Marc Benioff, Chair and CEO of Salesforce, stated that the joint offering would position Salesforce to dominate the $150 billion+ enterprise data market by creating “the most complete, agent-ready data platform in the industry.” This integration builds upon Salesforce’s previous acquisitions, such as MuleSoft, Tableau, and Slack, but is far more deeply rooted in the company’s AI-first future.

How Does Informatica Strengthen Agentforce and Autonomous AI?

The success of Salesforce’s emerging Agentforce platform — designed to deploy autonomous AI agents within enterprise environments — hinges on data precision, explainability, and governance. This is where Informatica’s advanced data cataloging, metadata systems, and MDM pipelines are expected to play a transformative role.

According to Salesforce CTO Steve Fisher, the merger will allow AI agents to understand not only what a data point represents but where it originated, how it was transformed, and what rules govern its use. That kind of depth, or “data comprehension,” will be critical for building systems of intelligence that execute high-stakes workflows in finance, healthcare, and public sector domains.

MuleSoft will benefit from standardized, trust-layered API data, while Tableau dashboards will draw from enriched metadata that enables deeper visual storytelling and interactive governance tracking. These integrations will effectively blur the line between data platform and AI system, creating what Salesforce calls a “system of understanding.”

How Does Informatica Fit Into Salesforce’s History of Strategic Acquisitions?

Salesforce’s acquisition of Informatica is the latest in a long series of platform-enhancing purchases that have progressively built out the company’s enterprise stack. Each major acquisition since 2018 has been designed to reinforce a different layer of the AI and data infrastructure vision Salesforce now calls “Customer 360 + AI + Trust.”

In 2018, Salesforce acquired MuleSoft for $6.5 billion, gaining one of the world’s most powerful API integration platforms. MuleSoft became the data movement backbone across on-premise, SaaS, and cloud applications, and now powers Salesforce’s Data Cloud ingest layer.

In 2019, Salesforce completed its $15.7 billion purchase of Tableau Software. This deal added powerful visual analytics capabilities and business intelligence dashboards, helping users interpret and act on insights generated within the Salesforce platform.

In 2020, Salesforce made its most high-profile acquisition to date with the $27.7 billion buyout of Slack Technologies. Slack was integrated as the collaboration layer in Customer 360 and now plays a central role in enterprise communication, workflow orchestration, and conversational interfaces for AI agents.

Other notable acquisitions include ClickSoftware (2019, $1.35 billion), which enhanced field service capabilities; Vlocity (2020, $1.3 billion), which added industry-specific CRM modules; and Datorama, a marketing analytics platform.

In this historical arc, Informatica’s role becomes clear. It is the data trust and governance layer that was missing — the invisible architecture required to power agentic AI in a safe, explainable, and scalable manner. With Informatica, Salesforce now controls the full value chain: from data ingestion (MuleSoft) and trust (Informatica) to visualization (Tableau) and execution (Agentforce, Slack).

What Does This Deal Mean for Customers and Partners?

For existing Salesforce customers — especially those in regulated sectors such as healthcare, financial services, and life sciences — this acquisition represents a dramatic improvement in out-of-the-box data trust and governance. Rather than relying on third-party integrations to validate data quality or lineage, users will now benefit from native access to Informatica’s policy frameworks and audit trails within the Salesforce UI.

Salesforce also plans to maintain and expand Informatica’s partner ecosystem, ensuring continuity for customers already embedded in multi-cloud data workflows. Additionally, Salesforce will leverage its global marketing, sales, and distribution capabilities to significantly expand Informatica’s cloud subscription business.

Robin Washington, Salesforce President and COO, remarked that the deal aligns with Salesforce’s disciplined M&A strategy and positions the company to aggressively differentiate itself in the AI and data management arena. The deal is expected to yield early benefits in key verticals such as government IT, pharma R&D, and digital health delivery.

Financial Details and Timeline of the Transaction

Under the terms of the agreement, Salesforce will acquire all outstanding shares of Informatica that it does not already own. The transaction has received board approval from both companies and will close in early FY2027, pending regulatory approvals and customary closing conditions.

Stockholders representing around 63% of Informatica’s voting power have already submitted written consent, making further shareholder action unnecessary. Salesforce will finance the deal through a mix of cash reserves and newly issued debt, with no expected impact on its capital return program.

Importantly, Salesforce anticipates accretion in non-GAAP operating margins, earnings per share, and free cash flow from the second year after close. Management expects the benefits to be driven by revenue synergies, improved data licensing potential, and platform unification under a single go-to-market structure.

How Did Investors React to the Informatica Deal?

The market response to the announcement was measured but optimistic. Informatica shares (NYSE: INFA) jumped 5.74% to close at $23.85 on May 27, 2025, approaching the $25-per-share acquisition price. This price action reflects confidence in the deal closing, while also limiting further upside due to the predefined valuation.

Salesforce shares (NYSE: CRM) closed at $276.57, up 0.85%, indicating that investors broadly view the deal as a strategic long-term positive. The muted upward move suggests that while the acquisition is seen as value-enhancing, investors are awaiting more concrete guidance during the upcoming earnings call on May 28, 2025.

Analysts issued mixed recommendations. For Salesforce, the consensus remains a “Hold” with cautious optimism, contingent on the company’s ability to execute fast integration without disrupting existing revenue streams. For Informatica, most analysts now recommend a “Hold” as well, with limited near-term upside beyond the acquisition offer price.

Institutional trading patterns support these views. Volumes in both INFA and CRM spiked post-announcement, and options activity in INFA suggests hedging and arbitrage positioning consistent with M&A closure scenarios. No unusual FII/DII flows were reported, but there is early positioning by buy-side firms anticipating a surge in Salesforce’s AI platform monetization from FY2027 onward.

How Does This Align With the Broader AI Infrastructure Landscape?

Salesforce’s move mirrors larger trends in the enterprise software world — particularly the shift toward owning the full AI and data stack. Google Cloud’s Looker unification, Microsoft’s investments in Fabric and Purview, and Oracle’s push into AI-lakehouse convergence are all reflective of the same underlying dynamic: in the age of AI, the company that controls the data layer controls the application layer.

Salesforce’s acquisition of Informatica is therefore not simply a tech upgrade — it is a structural reorientation toward becoming a full-stack AI infrastructure provider for the enterprise. This is especially important as agentic AI moves from demos and pilots into mission-critical systems.

With Informatica’s cloud ARR already surpassing $1 billion in FY2024, analysts estimate the combined business could generate $10–12 billion in platform-driven AI and data services revenue by FY2028, significantly expanding Salesforce’s TAM in enterprise infrastructure.