Databricks vs MicroStrategy comparison

The compared Databricks and MicroStrategy solutions aren't in the same category. Databricks is ranked #1 in Data Science Platforms , with an average rating of 8.2, and holds a 19.2% mindshare in the category. MicroStrategy is ranked #8 in BIT , with an average rating of 7.6, and holds a 3.4% mindshare. Additionally, 96% of Databricks users are willing to recommend the solution, compared to 92% of MicroStrategy users who would recommend it.

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Download the report

Executive Summary

We performed a comparison between Databricks and MicroStrategy based on real PeerSpot user reviews.

Find out what your peers are saying about Databricks, Knime, Amazon Web Services (AWS) and others in Data Science Platforms.

To learn more, read our detailed Data Science Platforms Report (Updated: December 2024).

Buyer's Guide

Data Science Platforms

December 2024

Download the complete report

Helped 824,053 peers since 2012

Categories and Ranking

IBM SPSS Statistics

Mindshare comparison

Data Science Platforms

BI (Business Intelligence) Tools

Featured Reviews

Md Masudul Hassan

Agricultural Finance and IT Researcher at Sher-e-Bangla Agricultural University

Comprehensive data analysis capabilities with a user-friendly interface, providing an efficient and reliable platform for researchers and analysts

I believe that offering short-term SPSS licenses, perhaps when customer sourcing is available, could make it more affordable. These licenses shouldn't include features tailored for universities or large sales organizations. Instead, they could offer discounts or additional facilities for smaller entities to access the software. In developing countries, it would be beneficial to provide certain features to users at no cost initially, while also customizing pricing options. For example, offering basic features to the first hundred users can help them become familiar with the software and its capabilities. This approach encourages users to upgrade to higher tiers as they become more experienced and require additional functionality.

Read full review

Dunstan Matekenya

Data Scientist at a financial services firm with 10,001+ employees

Process large-scale data sets and integrates with Apache Spark with notebook environment

Databricks integrates natively with Apache Spark, which I use as a processing engine for large-scale datasets. This native integration is one of its strengths. Another strength is that the platform makes it very easy to manage resources. For example, setting up a cluster of five or fifteen nodes is straightforward with Databricks. The notebook environment is also excellent, making it easy to perform various tasks.

Read full review

Azhagupandi Parthiban

Vice President Of Technology at a tech services company with 1,001-5,000 employees

Good for security and performance but lack of user-friendliness

MicroStrategy, for me, it's the visualization and user-friendliness that needs improvement. When compared to Power BI and Tableau, that's their sweet spot. They're super easy to pick up and use. Plus, they've got this cool association feature that updates when you change the timeframe. But with MicroStrategy, there's a lot of room for improvement, especially in integrating with developed mobile solutions using MicroStrategy. We struggled to deploy to iOS, and the Android adaptation was a big challenge for us. Everything that worked in iOS wouldn't work in Android, and videos and calendars were a whole other mess. So, user-friendliness for non-technical users and mobile performance on Android, particularly in India, where it's the dominant platform, those are my two big areas for improvement.

Read full review

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"The most valuable feature of IBM SPSS Statistics is all the functionality it provides. Additionally, it is simple to do the five-way analysis that you can into multidimensional setup space. It's the multidimensional space facility that is most useful."

"The most valuable features are the solution is easy to use, training new users is not difficult, and our usage is comprehensive because the whole service is beneficial."

"The most valuable feature is the user interface because you don't need to write code."

"It has the ability to easily change any variable in our research."

"The best part is that they have an algorithm handbook, so you can open it up and understand how it works, and if it is useful, this is very important."

"Most of the product features are good but I particularly like the linear regression analysis."

"The solution is very comprehensive, especially compared to Minitabs, which is considered more for manufacturing. However, whatever data you want to analyze can be handled with SPSS."

"You can find a complete algorithm in the solution and use it. You don't need to write your own algorithms for predictive analytics. That's the most valuable feature and the main one we use."

More IBM SPSS Statistics pros

"One of the features provides nice interactive clusters, or compute instances that you don't really need to manage often."

"I like cloud scalability and data access for any type of user."

"The most valuable feature of Databricks is the integration of the data warehouse and data lake, and the development of the lake house. Additionally, it integrates well with Spark for processing data in production."

"Databricks helps crunch petabytes of data in a very short period of time."

"The initial setup phase of Databricks was good."

"Databricks has a scalable Spark cluster creation process. The creators of Databricks are also the creators of Spark, and they are the industry leaders in terms of performance."

"I like the ability to use workspaces with other colleagues because you can work together even without seeing the other team's job."

"Databricks makes it really easy to use a number of technologies to do data analysis. In terms of languages, we can use Scala, Python, and SQL. Databricks enables you to run very large queries, at a massive scale, within really good timeframes."

More Databricks pros

"I think we have a huge enterprise-wide push to Visual Insight. Our environment has transformed over the last year. We were a strong "grid to PDF," "document to PDF," that's all we did. And then they came in with these Visual Insights and everyone was like, "Wow, that's kind of cool." We created a static reporting portal behind it and now, it's just taken our reports to another level. The level of insight that you get in a 30-second glimpse, it just revolutionized it for us. It gives the user a larger subset of the data so that they can actually maneuver around, rather than being specifically pointed at whatever your document is designed for."

"MicroStrategy's solution for mobile is very good."

"Semi-automatic support of implementing date dimensions, including delta to prior year implementation."

"The most valuable features are ad hoc reporting and the ability to create dashboards."

"The data governance leads people to trust the data that they have, and they know where to get it."

"Speed for high level aggregation by using Intelligent Cubes."

"Technical support is knowledgeable. The right person gets back to us whenever we email them."

"We have ramped up user adoption."

More MicroStrategy pros

Cons

"Needs more statistical modelling functions."

"SPSS slows down the computer or the laptop if the data is huge; then you need a faster computer."

"I think the visualization and charting should be changed and made easier and more effective."

"In developing countries, it would be beneficial to provide certain features to users at no cost initially, while also customizing pricing options."

"Most of the package will give you the fixed value, or the p-value, without an explanation as to whether it it significant or not. Some beginners might need not just the results, but also some explanation for them."

"The statistics should be more self-explanatory with detailed automated reports."

"The reports could be better."

"Better documentation on how to use macros."

More IBM SPSS Statistics cons

"Support for Microsoft technology and the compatibility with the .NET framework is somewhat missing."

"The product cannot be integrated with a popular coding IDE."

"I think setting up the whole account for one person and giving access are areas that can be difficult to manage and should be made a little easier."

"The connectivity with various BI tools could be improved, specifically the performance and real time integration."

"Would be helpful to have additional licensing options."

"In the future, I would like to see Data Lake support. That is something that I'm looking forward to."

"The data visualization for this solution could be improved. They have started to roll out a data visualization tool inside Databricks but it is in the early stages. It's not comparable to a solution like Power BI, Luca, or Tableau."

"Databricks could improve in some of its functionality."

More Databricks cons

"We did have issues with stability, and that was because we were co-located with another business unit, and we outgrew them on the unit. So we had to get to a separate physical instance."

"In the developer, there are things that you able to do in a document or a report that you are not able to do in the Dossier."

"Enterprise Manager should be a little bit less quirky when you build out-of-the-box customization reports for it."

"Another feature to consider in the future would be adding some additional offline capabilities without using desktops."

"They should give proper industry-based tutorials so that one can learn it easily and implement it based on the requirements. They should give more MMP files so that we can import a whole project altogether and learn from that project."

"If there are some advanced visualization features - maybe I'm not aware of them - but if there were a Vitara which could work on top of MicroStrategy, it would make sense for MicroStrategy to have that within their own library. So they should add more visualizations to the library."

"It is actually pretty complicated to use. It is complicated enough that user adaptation is sometimes difficult. We developed more experts rather than people using it."

"It needs row-level security, column-level security, on attributes. I want to be able to handle full-scale security model from the semantic layer, flat out."

More MicroStrategy cons

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The price of this solution is a little bit high, which was a problem for my company."

"The pricing of the modeler is high and can reduce the utility of the product for those who can not afford to adopt it."

"If it requires lot of data processing, maybe switching to IBM SPSS Clementine would be better for the buyer."

"It's quite expensive, but they do a special deal for universities."

"SPSS is an expensive piece of software because it's incredibly complex and has been refined over decades, but I would say it's fairly priced."

"Our licence is on a yearly renewal basis. While pricing is not the primary concern in our evaluation, as products are assessed by whether they can meet our user needs and expertise, the cost can be a limiting factor in the number of licences we procure."

"We think that IBM SPSS is expensive for this function."

"More affordable training for new staff members."

More IBM SPSS Statistics pricing and cost advice

"The price is okay. It's competitive."

"Databricks is a very expensive solution. Pricing is an area that could definitely be improved. They could provide a lower end compute and probably reduce the price."

"I am based in South Africa, where it is expensive adapting to the cloud, and then there is the price for the tool itself."

"The solution requires a subscription."

"I would rate the tool’s pricing an eight out of ten."

"The licensing costs of Databricks depend on how many licenses we need, depending on which Databricks provides a lot of discounts."

"The solution uses a pay-per-use model with an annual subscription fee or package. Typically this solution is used on a cloud platform, such as Azure or AWS, but more people are choosing Azure because the price is more reasonable."

"The solution is a good value for batch processing and huge workloads."

More Databricks pricing and cost advice

"The solution’s licensing cost is expensive."

"It would be nice if there was a sticker price that says, "This software costs this amount of money." But I think that's just indicative of all software vendors. A lot of people are in it to make money, commissions, so it's just the nature of the business. But I would like to see more transparency, more equality, on pricing. Some people get better deals than others, I think."

"We actually researched some of the other solutions. For options, price, and customer acceptance, this product has worked well for us."

"They need to work on their license structure. They are not competitive against somebody like SAP BusinessObjects. We had a quote that was almost a third the price, coming from SAP BusinessObjects, and it's not a better platform. It's not cheaper. They do concurrent user licensing, while MicroStrategy does named user licensing, and that was literally the only difference. But it made a $500,000 difference. They've got to do something to make themselves more competitive. Maybe it's assessing your business users and what you really expect them to use, and maybe giving a reduced price on that. But they are already giving us a 60% discount and they were still a million or so above, over a three-year time period. That doesn't account for synergies as we get from on-site resources that are already available, but I thought that that was a big, big deficit for them."

"I am unsure what the licensing costs are for this solution however, development costs are around $100,000 per year."

"They gave us a good deal."

"There is no subscription, I am using the free version."

"For larger businesses, the pricing is logical."

More MicroStrategy pricing and cost advice

See which vendors are best for you

Use our free recommendation engine to learn which Data Science Platforms solutions are best for your needs.

See recommendations

824,053 professionals have used our research since 2012.

Comparison Review

it_user6330

Product Manager at a retailer with 10,001+ employees

May 2, 2013

MicroStrategy vs. Tableau

After a recent presentation, several attendees asked me about the applications of Visual Insights and Tableau. Many companies are investing in both tools and are trying to figure out the right tool for specific applications Tableau has found its sweet-spot as an agile discovery tool that analysts…

Read full review

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Financial Services Firm

17%

Computer Software Company

University

Manufacturing Company

Financial Services Firm

16%

Computer Software Company

11%

Manufacturing Company

Healthcare Company

Financial Services Firm

18%

Computer Software Company

10%

Retailer

Insurance Company

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about IBM SPSS Statistics?

The software offers consistency across multiple research projects helping us with predictive analytics capabilities.

See all answers

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for IBM SPSS Statistics?

The cost of IBM SPSS Statistics is managed by organizations, not individual researchers. It is a very expensive produ...

See all answers

What needs improvement with IBM SPSS Statistics?

IBM SPSS Statistics does not keep you close to your data like KNIME. In KNIME, at every stage, you can see the result...

See all answers

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 ...

See all answers

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 designe...

See all answers

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 analyti...

See all answers

What do you like most about MicroStrategy?

The stability of the product is good.

See all answers

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for MicroStrategy?

For larger businesses, I think the pricing is logical, but for smaller companies, it can be a bit costly.

See all answers

What needs improvement with MicroStrategy?

There is a need to improve the automatic generation of metrics in MicroStrategy, as currently everything must be done...

See all answers

Comparisons

IBM SPSS Modeler vs IBM SPSS Statistics

Compared 16% of the time

Alteryx vs IBM SPSS Statistics

Compared 13% of the time

TIBCO Statistica vs IBM SPSS Statistics

Compared 13% of the time

Microsoft Azure Machine Learning Studio vs IBM SPSS Statistics

Compared 11% of the time

Amazon SageMaker vs IBM SPSS Statistics

Compared 6% of the time

More IBM SPSS Statistics Competitors

Dataiku vs Databricks

Compared 11% of the time

Informatica PowerCenter vs Databricks

Compared 8% of the time

Amazon SageMaker vs Databricks

Compared 8% of the time

Dremio vs Databricks

Compared 8% of the time

Microsoft Power BI vs Databricks

Compared 7% of the time

More Databricks Competitors

Tableau vs MicroStrategy

Compared 23% of the time

Microsoft Power BI vs MicroStrategy

Compared 18% of the time

Amazon QuickSight vs MicroStrategy

Compared 8% of the time

SAP BusinessObjects Business Intelligence Platform vs MicroStrategy

Compared 7% of the time

Qlik Sense vs MicroStrategy

Compared 5% of the time

More MicroStrategy Competitors

Product Reports

Buyer's Guide

IBM SPSS Statistics

December 2024

Download IBM SPSS Statistics product report

Buyer's Guide

Databricks

December 2024

Download Databricks product report

Buyer's Guide

MicroStrategy

December 2024

Download MicroStrategy product report

Also Known As

SPSS Statistics

Databricks Unified Analytics, Databricks Unified Analytics Platform, Redash

No data available

Learn More

Video not available

IBM

Databricks

MicroStrategy

Overview

IBM SPSS Statistics is a powerful data mining solution that is designed to aid business leaders in making important business decisions. It is designed so that it can be effectively utilized by organizations across a wide range of fields. SPSS Statistics allows users to leverage machine learning algorithms so that they can mine and analyze data in the most effective way possible.

IBM SPSS Statistics Benefits

Some of the ways that organizations can benefit by choosing to deploy IBM SPSS Statistics include:

Ease of use. SPSS Statistics enables users to simply and intuitively take control of their statistical needs. The solution is designed so that analysts who do not know how to code can easily make full use of the various tools and capabilities that SPSS Statistics has to offer. Its command language is so straightforward that it does not require users to undergo special training before they use it.

Comprehensive and flexible build. SPSS Statistics is designed to be both a comprehensive and highly flexible analytics solution. It enables users to utilize a variety of integrations that make it easy for users to add features that they might feel they are missing.

Automation. SPSS Statistics makes it simple for users to automate basic tasks that they might otherwise devote too much time worrying about. Tasks like calculation or data gathering can be delegated to the system while more conceptual tasks like data analysis are given to an organization’s analysts to handle.

IBM SPSS Statistics Features

Intuitive user interface. SPSS Statistics enables users to deploy an intuitive interface that makes the process of system management simple. Among the other components of this interface is a drag-and-drop feature that makes analysis and management possible for anyone who wants to use it.

Advanced data visualizations. Analysts that employ SPSS Statistics gain access to tools that empower them to create and export data visualizations. These visualizations can be formatted in many different ways depending on what the user needs.

Local data storage. SPSS Statistics has the ability to securely store data on a user’s computer. This enables them to add layers of security that would not necessarily be present if the data was stored in the cloud.

Reviews from Real Users

IBM SPSS Statistics is a highly effective solution that stands out when compared to many of its competitors. Two major advantages it offers are the wealth of functionalities that it provides and its high level of accessibility.

An Emeritus Professor of Health Services Research at a university writes, "The most valuable feature of IBM SPSS Statistics is all the functionality it provides. Additionally, it is simple to do the five-way analysis that you can in a multidimensional setup space. It's the multidimensional space facility that is most useful."

A Director of Systems Management & MIS Operations at a university, says, “The SPSS interface is very accessible and user-friendly. It's really easy to get information from it. I've shared it with experts and beginners, and everyone can navigate it.”

Databricks is utilized for advanced analytics, big data processing, machine learning models, ETL operations, data engineering, streaming analytics, and integrating multiple data sources.

Organizations leverage Databricks for predictive analysis, data pipelines, data science, and unifying data architectures. It is also used for consulting projects, financial reporting, and creating APIs. Industries like insurance, retail, manufacturing, and pharmaceuticals use Databricks for data management and analytics due to its user-friendly interface, built-in machine learning libraries, support for multiple programming languages, scalability, and fast processing.

What are the key features of Databricks?

User-friendly interface: Simplifies operations and usability.
Built-in machine learning libraries: Facilitates machine learning tasks.
Support for multiple programming languages: Enhances flexibility.
Scalability: Efficiently handles growing data needs.
Fast processing: Improves performance and speed.
Automated optimization: Reduces manual efforts.
Data visualization: Provides insightful visuals.
Collaborative features: Enhances teamwork.
Delta Lake performance: Boosts data management.
Seamless cluster management: Simplifies system operations.

What are the benefits or ROI to look for in Databricks reviews?

Efficiency in handling large datasets: Ensures smooth processing.
Interactive workspace environment: Improves user collaboration.
Integration with platforms: Provides connectivity benefits.
Performance optimization: Enhances overall system performance.
Support for data governance and security: Ensures data integrity and protection.

Databricks is implemented in insurance for risk analysis and claims processing; in retail for customer analytics and inventory management; in manufacturing for predictive maintenance and supply chain optimization; and in pharmaceuticals for drug discovery and patient data analysis. Users value its scalability, machine learning support, collaboration tools, and Delta Lake performance but seek improvements in visualization, pricing, and integration with BI tools.

Company: Founded in 1989, MicroStrategy (Nasdaq: MSTR) is a leading worldwide provider of enterprise software platforms. With direct operations in 26 countries worldwide and approximately 2,000 employees, our mission is to provide enterprise analytics, mobility, and security platforms that are flexible, powerful, scalable and user-friendly. To learn more, visit MicroStrategy online, and follow us on Facebook and Twitter.

Product portfoilio:

MicroStrategy 10 Secure Enterprise™ empowers leading organizations to analyze vast amounts of data and distribute actionable business insight throughout an enterprise through two distinct offerings: MicroStrategy Analytics™ and MicroStrategy Desktop™. MicroStrategy Analytics delivers reports and dashboards, and enables users to conduct ad hoc analysis and share insights anywhere, anytime, via mobile devices or the Web. It also combines the agility and productivity of self-service visual data discovery with the security, scalability, and governance features of enterprise-grade business intelligence. MicroStrategy Desktop is a standalone, on-premise visual data discovery tool designed to enable business users to analyze and understand their data. MicroStrategy Mobile™ enables organizations to rapidly build custom business applications that deliver analytics combined with transactions, multimedia, and custom workflows to mobile devices. MicroStrategy Secure Cloud™ combines all of the enterprise analytics, mobile, and security features in MicroStrategy 10 Secure Enterprise with powerful and scalable data integration, validation, and warehousing services — all delivered in an environment where organizations can deploy transformational analytics applications in minutes.

Usher, MicroStrategy’s breakthrough security solution, is a powerful mobile security platform designed to dematerialize traditional forms of identity verification (such as passwords, tokens, and physical badges) and replace them with a single mobile identity badge that is cryptographically linked to its owner’s smartphone and dynamically linked to an enterprise’s existing identity repositories. Usher works on standard Android and iOS smartphones, and also boasts an Apple Watch™ integration.

Sample Customers

LDB Group, RightShip, Tennessee Highway Patrol, Capgemini Consulting, TEAC Corporation, Ironside, nViso SA, Razorsight, Si.mobil, University Hospitals of Leicester, CROOZ Inc., GFS Fundraising Solutions, Nedbank Ltd., IDS-TILDA

Elsevier, MyFitnessPal, Sharethrough, Automatic Labs, Celtra, Radius Intelligence, Yesware

Allstate Insurance, Barneys New York, Boston Children's Hospital, Buenos Aires Department of the Treasury, Campbell Soup Company, DHL, eBay, eHarmony, Facebook, Four Seasons Hotels Inc., Godiva, Hard Rock International, LinkedIn, Netflix, Pfizer, SECO (Swiss Government Unemployment Agency), Starbucks, Texas A&M University, Thomson Reuters Markets, US House of Representatives, and the US Postal Service.

Buyer's Guide

Data Science Platforms

December 2024

Download Free Report

Find out what your peers are saying about Databricks, Knime, Amazon Web Services (AWS) and others in Data Science Platforms. Updated: December 2024.

DOWNLOAD NOW

824,053 professionals have used our research since 2012.

We monitor all Data Science Platforms reviews to prevent fraudulent reviews and keep review quality high. We do not post reviews by company employees or direct competitors. We validate each review for authenticity via cross-reference with LinkedIn, and personal follow-up with the reviewer when necessary.