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Databricks vs IBM Cognos comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive Summary

Review summaries and opinions

We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use. Here are some excerpts of what they said:
 

ROI

Sentiment score
6.6
Organizations experience mixed returns from Databricks, with benefits from cost savings and efficiency, but challenges in initial migration.
Sentiment score
7.1
IBM Cognos offers mixed returns; some save significantly, others find it costly, but generally enhances insights and processes.
When it comes to big data processing, I prefer Databricks over other solutions.
For a lot of different tasks, including machine learning, it is a nice solution.
 

Customer Service

Sentiment score
7.2
Databricks customer service is generally effective with prompt responses, though some report issues mainly with third-party support channels.
Sentiment score
6.3
IBM Cognos support is responsive and expert but criticized for high costs, slow resolutions, and complexity in customer service.
Whenever we reach out, they respond promptly.
I rate technical support from IBM as eight out of ten, indicating a high quality of service.
 

Scalability Issues

Sentiment score
7.4
Databricks is praised for efficient scalability and cloud compatibility, allowing easy resource adjustment across diverse projects and industries.
Sentiment score
7.6
IBM Cognos offers scalable solutions, supporting large deployments with proper server architecture, powerful hardware, and seamless software integration.
The patches have sometimes caused issues leading to our jobs being paused for about six hours.
It can be scaled out to other teams, but requires building cubes and implementing policies.
 

Stability Issues

Sentiment score
7.7
Databricks is stable and efficient for large data, with minor issues during updates and occasional connectivity challenges.
Sentiment score
7.3
IBM Cognos is praised for stability and performance, surpassing competitors, with minor issues often due to server configuration.
They release patches that sometimes break our code.
Cluster failure is one of the biggest weaknesses I notice in our Databricks.
I rate the stability of this solution as nine out of ten, indicating it is highly stable.
 

Room For Improvement

Databricks users desire improved UI, enhanced data visualization, better integration, clearer error messages, robust support, and comprehensive documentation.
IBM Cognos needs UI upgrades, better data visualization, improved performance, and advanced self-service features to compete with rivals.
We prefer using a small to mid-sized cluster for many jobs to keep costs low, but this sometimes doesn't support our operations properly.
If I could right-click to copy absolute paths or to read files directly into a data frame, it would standardize and simplify the process.
We use MLflow for managing MLOps, however, further improvement would be beneficial, especially for large language models and related tools.
There is room for improvement in self-service analytics and predictiveness.
 

Setup Cost

Databricks pricing depends on usage, with flexibility in licensing, and can vary in competitiveness compared to other solutions.
IBM Cognos is costlier but offers extensive features, complex licensing, and competitive SaaS options for SMEs, emphasizing negotiation.
I rate pricing as a four, meaning it is more expensive compared to other solutions.
 

Valuable Features

Databricks provides a unified platform for data engineering, machine learning, seamless cloud integration, and robust data management capabilities.
IBM Cognos offers powerful analytics, flexible reporting, strong visualization, and robust security with scalability and ease of use.
Databricks' capability to process data in parallel enhances data processing speed.
Developers can share their notebooks. Git and Azure DevOps integration on the Databricks side is also very helpful.
IBM Cognos is a robust governed platform with significant security features and provides excellent graphics and reporting.
 

Categories and Ranking

Databricks
Average Rating
8.2
Reviews Sentiment
7.0
Number of Reviews
88
Ranking in other categories
Cloud Data Warehouse (7th), Data Science Platforms (1st), Streaming Analytics (1st)
IBM Cognos
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
7.1
Number of Reviews
135
Ranking in other categories
BI (Business Intelligence) Tools (7th), Reporting (4th)
 

Mindshare comparison

While both are Business Intelligence solutions, they serve different purposes. Databricks is designed for Cloud Data Warehouse and holds a mindshare of 7.2%, up 2.7% compared to last year.
IBM Cognos, on the other hand, focuses on BI (Business Intelligence) Tools, holds 3.8% mindshare, down 4.3% since last year.
Cloud Data Warehouse
BI (Business Intelligence) Tools
 

Featured Reviews

ShubhamSharma7 - PeerSpot reviewer
Capability to integrate diverse coding languages in a single notebook greatly enhances workflow
Databricks offers various courses that I can use, whether it's PySpark, Scala, or R. I can leverage all these courses in a single notebook, which is beneficial for clients as they can access various tools in one place whenever needed. This is quite significant. I usually work with PySpark based on client requirements. After coding, I feed the Databricks notebooks into the ADF pipeline for updates. Databricks' capability to process data in parallel enhances data processing speed. Furthermore, I can connect our Databricks notebook directly with Power BI and other visualization tools like Qlik. Once we develop code, it allows us to transform raw data into visualizations for clients using analysis diagrams, which is very helpful.
AMOL JAJU - PeerSpot reviewer
Offers ad hoc analysis reports and good for operational dashboarding
There used to be many valuable features, but in the last three or four years, whatever IBM is doing with enhancements, it has taken a lot of time to build and develop. But the best usage of Cognos is the ad hoc analysis reports. I really like that. Our customers also like that. But now the usage of Cognos and OBIE is reduced by various business users because people and business users are now more focused on analytics, slice and dice, and the dashboard, and the widgets.
report
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Comparison Review

it_user79932 - PeerSpot reviewer
Feb 4, 2015
Comparison of SAP BO, Tableau, QlikView, Cognos, Microsoft, OBIEE and Pentaho
1. SAP BO/BI Enterprise scalability Security Ease of use Semantic layer 2. Tableau Visualization Data discovery Turnaround time 3. IBM Cognos Enterprise scalability Security In-memory feature 4. MS BI - Flexibility 5. Pentaho - Open source but still enterprise grade 6. QlikView Data…
 

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
17%
Computer Software Company
11%
Manufacturing Company
9%
Healthcare Company
6%
Educational Organization
56%
Financial Services Firm
7%
Computer Software Company
4%
Manufacturing Company
4%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

Which do you prefer - Databricks or Azure Machine Learning Studio?
Databricks gives you the option of working with several different languages, such as SQL, R, Scala, Apache Spark, or Python. It offers many different cluster choices and excellent integration with ...
How would you compare Databricks vs Amazon SageMaker?
We researched AWS SageMaker, but in the end, we chose Databricks. Databricks is a Unified Analytics Platform designed to accelerate innovation projects. It is based on Spark so it is very fast. It...
Which would you choose - Databricks or Azure Stream Analytics?
Databricks is an easy-to-set-up and versatile tool for data management, analysis, and business analytics. For analytics teams that have to interpret data to further the business goals of their orga...
Seeking lightweight open source BI software
It depends on the Data architecture and the complexity of your requirement. Some great tools in the market are Qlik Sense, Power BI, OBIEE, Tableau, etc. I have recently started using Cognos Enter...
What do you like most about IBM Cognos?
The solution's most valuable feature is its ease of use, which makes it easily compatible with other tools.
What needs improvement with IBM Cognos?
I need improvements, particularly with the Framework Manager, which has an outdated user interface from older versions like IBM Cognos 10 or 8. Additionally, the Event Studio, which offered great f...
 

Also Known As

Databricks Unified Analytics, Databricks Unified Analytics Platform, Redash
Cognos, Cognos Analytics, IBM Cognos Analytics
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Elsevier, MyFitnessPal, Sharethrough, Automatic Labs, Celtra, Radius Intelligence, Yesware
More than 23,000 leading organizations across multiple industries use Cognos. Some examples of Cognos customers include BMW Financial Services, Quinte Health Care, Troy Corporation, Michigan State University, and GKN Land System.
Find out what your peers are saying about Snowflake Computing, Microsoft, Google and others in Cloud Data Warehouse. Updated: February 2025.
838,713 professionals have used our research since 2012.