Turn Disconnected Data into Trusted Context

Learning Objectives

After completing this unit, you’ll be able to:

• Explain how Data 360 is the signal that powers the agentic enterprise.
  
• Describe the zero-copy architecture and the role of the Metadata Platform.
  
• Explain how RAG ensures trusted AI by providing context to act.
  

What’s Data 360?

In the age of AI, data alone isn’t enough. AI agents need context and they need understanding. That’s what Data 360, the next generation of Data Cloud, delivers. Data 360 turns every piece of data—structured or unstructured—into a trusted signal that powers the entire agentic enterprise.

By connecting every data source with zero copy architecture, Data 360 unifies enterprise data, customer data, and now even unstructured data like PDFs, Slack messages, and Teams conversations. This creates a single, intelligent view of every customer and every operation. Agents can understand context, reason in real time, and take precise action across any workflow.

And because Data 360 stores customer interactions and preferences directly from Agentforce, agents can remember every conversation, building richer, more personal relationships over time. Governance is built in, too. Data 360 automatically applies privacy, compliance, and security policies across all data, structured or unstructured. That’s trust at scale, and it’s what makes transformation possible for every company.

AI Needs Context to Take Action

AI can’t act intelligently without context. Raw data tells us what happened—but metadata and semantics explain what it means.

• Data gives the facts.
  
• Metadata gives structure.
  
• Semantics adds meaning or the business logic.
  

When agents understand structure and meaning, they move from guessing to knowing. That’s when AI stops reacting and starts reasoning—helping teams predict outcomes, personalize experiences, and act with confidence.

This process of retrieving trusted data and grounding the model’s response in metadata and semantics is known as retrieval augmented generation (RAG), ensuring every agent acts with accuracy and trust.

How Data 360 Works

Every interaction inside Agentforce 350 begins as a signal like a chat, email, or event. Data 360 acts as the connective engine that transforms that signal into understanding. Here’s how:

1. Connects data everywhere it lives: Data 360 unifies Salesforce data with external systems like SAP, Workday, Snowflake, and AWS without moving the data using zero copy.
   
2. Enriches it with metadata and context: Structured, unstructured, and behavioral data are harmonized, giving every agent and app a complete view of the business.
   
3. Activates that data across the enterprise: Agents can access this context in real time through the Metadata Platform and act directly within Agentforce 360 apps, or anywhere across the enterprise, from HR to IT to Commerce.
   
4. Ensures governance and trust: Built-in policies ensure every action remains secure, compliant, and explainable. This is critical for enterprise-scale AI.
   

With Data 360, context and trust come together to make every app and agent smarter, faster, and more reliable. It’s how Agentforce transforms data into intelligence that can be used instantly.

Data 360 Brings It All Together

Every piece of data is a signal. Data 360 activates those signals across the entire enterprise. Structured, unstructured, semantic, and behavioral data all come together to form a single, living foundation of truth.

For Agentforce, that means every agent acts with deeper understanding and precision. For teams, it means every decision is faster, smarter, and more trusted. And for customers, it means every interaction is more personal and meaningful.

Data 360 transforms data into understanding, and understanding into action, powering the next generation of the agentic enterprise.

Resources

• Salesforce Web Page: Data 360–Activate Trusted Data Everywhere
• Salesforce Web Page: How Does Data 360 work?