IBM DataPower Gateway vs Layer7 API Management comparison

IBM and Broadcom are both solutions in the API Management category. IBM is ranked #11 with an average rating of 8.6, while Broadcom is ranked #10 with an average rating of 7.6. IBM holds a 3.8% mindshare in APIM, compared to Broadcom’s 3.1% mindshare. Additionally, 96% of IBM users are willing to recommend the solution, compared to 90% of Broadcom users who would recommend it.

IBM DataPower Gateway

Read 28 IBM DataPower Gateway reviews

5,978 Views
4,494 Comparison Views

96% willing to recommend

Layer7 API Management

Read 111 Layer7 API Management reviews

5,068 Views
3,774 Comparison Views

90% willing to recommend

IBM DataPower Gateway

Layer7 API Management

Comparison Buyer's Guide

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Executive SummaryUpdated on Dec 17, 2024

IBM DataPower Gateway and Layer7 API Management are competitors in the API management space. Layer7 API Management appears to have the upper hand due to its versatile feature set and ease of use.

Features: IBM DataPower Gateway offers extensive encryption and threat protection features, scalability for large IT infrastructures, and seamless integrations. Layer7 API Management provides API customization flexibility, strong analytics tools for better decision-making, and adaptability to enterprise needs.

Room for Improvement: IBM DataPower Gateway could improve in terms of ease of deployment and reducing complexity in integration. Enhanced user interface and simplified configuration options would also be beneficial. Layer7 API Management may benefit from enhanced monitoring capabilities, a more robust management interface, and faster release of new features.

Ease of Deployment and Customer Service: IBM DataPower Gateway's advanced security measures make its deployment more complex, but it offers dedicated customer support. Layer7 API Management allows for quicker setup and integration, offering strong support that caters to agile business operations.

Pricing and ROI: IBM DataPower Gateway has a higher initial setup cost justified by its security and scalability features. Layer7 API Management offers better long-term ROI due to lower initial investment and a comprehensive feature set, providing significant value over time.

To learn more, read our detailed IBM DataPower Gateway vs. Layer7 API Management Report (Updated: January 2025).

Buyer's Guide

IBM DataPower Gateway vs. Layer7 API Management

January 2025

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Review summaries and opinions

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

Categories and Ranking

IBM DataPower Gateway

Ranking in API Management

11th

Average Rating

8.4

Reviews Sentiment

6.9

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

Enterprise Service Bus (ESB) (6th), Application Infrastructure (9th), SOA Application Gateways (1st)

Layer7 API Management

Ranking in API Management

10th

Average Rating

8.4

Reviews Sentiment

6.9

Number of Reviews

111

Ranking in other categories

No ranking in other categories

Mindshare comparison

As of January 2025, in the API Management category, the mindshare of IBM DataPower Gateway is 3.8%, up from 3.8% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Layer7 API Management is 3.1%, down from 3.2% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.

API Management

Featured Reviews

Mehdi El Filahi

Co-Founder at tenekit

Security features meets compliance needs and offers MPGW (Multi-Protocol Gateway) that simplifies integration efforts

While I like IBM products, I'm not an evangelist. I work with Java, Microsoft ASP.NET, and various technologies. I'm not tied to any specific vendor. However, I do find IBM to be a bit greedy. It's a large, profit-driven company. The support team is mostly based in India, and they follow a very structured process and protocol. Sometimes, it feels like playing ping pong with them – lots of back and forth before the problem gets escalated. You might even have to get your sales rep involved to push things along. For me, the support it could be better. Indian support teams aren't inherently bad, but with IBM, it feels impersonal. They respond, sure. But if it's a complex technical issue, they might ask you a lot of questions that just seem designed to waste your time. Sometimes it feels like they hope you'll get frustrated and solve the problem yourself.

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Ronald D'Souza

Presales Consultant for CA Southern Africa at Hyperion Holding Pty Ltd

Has great drag-and-drop features and it requires minimal coding

I have mainly implemented using Layer 7 API Management. Some of the major challenges we were able to meet with a quick release to market methodology. Some of the tasks which we achieved for our customers were: 1. Translation service from SOAP to REST and vice versa. 2. API service to DB (Oracle, MySQL, MSSQL, Snowflake, SAP HANA) -- Created Swagger APIs that were able to perform CRUD operation to the backend API mentioned above and provided routes to query and get data. 3. Integration with Payment gateway service providers to perform (transaction on behalf of the customer with third-party payment gateway service providers white labeled with our APIs ) -- Followed TMF standards for payment gateway integration with the Telcom world. 4. Orchestration of the API. Build multiple microservers and provided orchestration based on route, path, and data in the request and perform actions that would be communicated with multiple APIs and provide a single consolidated response. 5. Provided API-driven security (Oauth 2.0, JWT, SAML, Basic, and a variety of means) to access the API giving the developer the freedom to concentrate only on application/service/microservice and let the gateway handle the threat. 6. Seamless Mutual Authentication allowed good segregation between APIs in the DMZ and internal network.

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

"It can look for the various security threats, productions, payload scanning, and perform routing based on the content type."

"It is easy to use, easy to install, and it's resilient for high availability."

"The solution is robust."

"Its initial setup was straightforward."

"The solution is very easy to work with."

"I like the tool's security. Also, all functionalities are integrated within on platform."

"Support for PCA and non-PCA services is valuable."

"The MPGW (Multi-Protocol Gateway) is great because it allows you to easily expose services using various protocols – web services, REST (JSON), and others. This flexibility simplifies things."

More IBM DataPower Gateway pros

"Compared to other vendors, this product is much faster in coming up with new features, which is good."

"The benefits are rapid development and deployment of APIs, which means that your information, your ability to handle information, to receive it and to send it, to visualize it, to report on it, to get intelligence out of it, happens fast and happens with accuracy."

"Containerization and the monetization module are quite unique for an API tool... In addition, the development time and rollout time are pretty quick."

"We loved the portal part the most, which had monetization and showed how people were using the stuff. It is a good product as a whole and has a lot of microservices and granular features."

"There are a couple aspects of performance. One is just speed and uptime, and it's stellar in that regard. The other is, how much effort is it to put it in place in the first place, and then how much effort is it to keep it operational. That's where its real strength is. I'm able to do things quickly and easily that I couldn't do before."

"The most valuable feature of Layer7 API Management is that their policy is really easy to develop and it is flexible."

"One of the features that the tool provides is the ability to simply onboard new APIs to an existing security platform. We build all the policies for security upfront, and then we can add those policies pretty simply and straightforwardly to any new API that gets developed in the enterprise."

"What I found most valuable in Layer7 API Management is that you can launch the API from the gateway quickly and securely, making it less complicated to deploy APIs. I also like that Layer7 API Management has a good portal and dashboards and that the dashboards show you statistics regarding how many people used the API, etc."

More Layer7 API Management pros

Cons

"Additional documentation needs to be provided for complex automations."

"An area for improvement in IBM DataPower Gateway is its price point because it's a relatively expensive product. Sometimes, when the customer use case is just a very small subset of what's being offered in IBM DataPower Gateway, then the product can be expensive, making my company lose some of the opportunities because of the expensive pricing. A lower price point for IBM DataPower Gateway, even if that results in a less feature-rich version, would be appreciated. In terms of additional features that I'd like to see in the next release of IBM DataPower Gateway, nothing specific comes to mind because IBM constantly improves its standards and provides quarterly updates to the product, so it's quite fine."

"In the next release, I would like to see the product price reduced. It should be cheaper."

"The two biggest issues of this solution are the complexity and the maintenance procedures."

"For the workloads that are not too high, appliance is a little bit expensive."

"The product's cost for data appliances or hardware is quite high. It needs improvement."

"The user interface or the application development perspective and customization of the tool could be a little better."

"They should improve the solution's clustering features."

More IBM DataPower Gateway cons

"Needs to work better with DB2 UDB."

"we cannot add gateways on the fly because there are a lot of moving parts; endpoint connectivity is one of them. If we add more nodes then the rate-limiting feature is affected. This kind of gateway always has the scalability issue. But, I think CA is coming up with its Microgateway, which is in Beta. If they stabilize their Microgateway platform, we could do very well in terms of scalability."

"The solution should prioritize ease of use and align with the growing trend of cloud-native environments."

"There is room for improvement in terms of innovation and investment, especially when compared to other leading products in the market."

"The developer portal needs to fully supported SOAP services (including WSDL publication with security), it would certainly push adoption for us."

"What is really important is that they offer the solution as a service, on a subscription or monthly basis, which will make it more attractive. That is where the market is headed. There are competitors within the industry that are doing that currently. I would encourage CA to do that."

"The OTK, however, is a complex upgrade. They tend to change the schemas on the database behind it, between the versions, which can be a pain to have to migrate all of our existing clients from one database schema to the other."

"The interface is Java which is difficult to make look very nice."

More Layer7 API Management cons

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The solution has a return on investment but is a little expensive."

"The total cost of IBM DataPower Gateway would depend on the configuration, but in my experience, it can amount to 60,000 Euros per box, even for the virtual version. Usually, customers need high availability and a non-production environment, so the total price for IBM DataPower Gateway can be quite a lot. It can be 200,000 Euros or a similar figure."

"The licensing cost is very expensive."

"The appliance is a bit on the expensive side for the workloads that are not too high."

"The cost of this product varies from customer to customer and the relationship with IBM, including how many offerings from IBM are already being used."

"The cost is very high and requires all five components in the API management solution."

"As far as I know, they have a perpetual license for this product. They are paying perpetual fees rather than an annual subscription or annual pricing."

"The product is expensive."

More IBM DataPower Gateway pricing and cost advice

"I feel that it is costly for medium-sized companies."

"The price of Layer7 API Management is too high and should be reduced. However, it is a good solution in the market."

"CA has great pricing for gateways, so negotiate with your sales team."

"At the time we bought the product it was a perpetual users license and there has been no need for additional licensing fees."

"It is a pricey product, although not extremely overpriced compared to competitors in the market."

"If the CA pricing for API management would be a little lower, they would be able to cover a broader market."

"Purchase 4.0 now and wait until they flush out the 4.1 problems."

"Pricing is competitive. CA is ready to offer attractive discounts."

More Layer7 API Management pricing and cost advice

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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Financial Services Firm

31%

Insurance Company

Computer Software Company

Government

Financial Services Firm

20%

Computer Software Company

13%

Manufacturing Company

Government

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about IBM DataPower Gateway?

The MPGW (Multi-Protocol Gateway) is great because it allows you to easily expose services using various protocols – web services, REST (JSON), and others. This flexibility simplifies things.

See all answers

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for IBM DataPower Gateway?

I would rate the pricing a two out of ten, with one being high price, and ten being low price. It's high-priced for smaller companies. But it is okay for enterprises. So, the price could be more fl...

See all answers

What needs improvement with IBM DataPower Gateway?

The price could be more flexible for different clients.

See all answers

What do you like most about Layer7 API Management?

The solution's technical support is good.

See all answers

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Layer7 API Management?

The pricing is expensive compared to other products.

See all answers

What needs improvement with Layer7 API Management?

Layer7 API Management could be improved in its logging and alert mechanisms. Furthermore, although cloud deployment has been introduced, I am not familiar with all recent updates. In previous versi...

See all answers

Comparisons

IBM API Connect vs IBM DataPower Gateway

Compared 33% of the time

Apigee vs IBM DataPower Gateway

Compared 13% of the time

Microsoft Azure API Management vs IBM DataPower Gateway

Compared 9% of the time

Kong Gateway Enterprise vs IBM DataPower Gateway

Compared 6% of the time

Tyk vs IBM DataPower Gateway

Compared 2% of the time

More IBM DataPower Gateway Competitors

Apigee vs Layer7 API Management

Compared 33% of the time

MuleSoft API Manager vs Layer7 API Management

Compared 16% of the time

Kong Gateway Enterprise vs Layer7 API Management

Compared 15% of the time

Amazon API Gateway vs Layer7 API Management

Compared 11% of the time

IBM API Connect vs Layer7 API Management

Compared 3% of the time

More Layer7 API Management Competitors

Product Reports

Buyer's Guide

IBM DataPower Gateway

January 2025

Download IBM DataPower Gateway product report

Buyer's Guide

Layer7 API Management

January 2025

Download Layer7 API Management product report

Also Known As

WebSphere DataPower, IBM DataPower, IBM WebSphere DataPower

CA API Management, CA Live API Creator, Espresso Logic, CA API Gateway

Learn More

IBM

Broadcom

Overview

IBM DataPower Gateway is a robust, secure next-generation enterprise-grade single multichannel API gateway that supplies dynamic access, integration, control, and outstanding security. The solution is available in a broad range of workload capabilities, including application programming interface (API), service oriented architecture (SOA), B2B, cloud, web, and mobile. These dynamic capabilities ensure users are able to quickly increase the reach of an organization's critical IT resources to new channels, which will provide shareholders, team members, and clients with safe, secure access at all times.

DataPower Gateway is very flexible and is widely available in virtual, cloud, traditional, physical, Docker, and Linux form factors.

IBM DataPower Gateway Features

IBM DataPower Gateway has many value-added features. Some of these features are included below:

Control: The solution provides decision point authorization and authentication for all standards, including Lightweight Direct Access Protocol (LDAP) and Open Authorization (OAuth), which allow for better access control across an organization’s entire network.
DataPower dashboard: The dashboard is specifically designed to enhance performance and determine problematic processes. The solution provides intuitive real-time performance transparency to diagnose operational and performance anomalies and offer repair and restoration recommendations.
Enhanced messaging: Users are able to easily mediate messaging and protocols by incorporating the best of today’s traditional and modern application standards.
Integration: IBM DataPower Gateway offers super fast mainframe connectivity, database connectivity, transport protocol bridging, content-based routing, and any-to-any message transformation, ensuring secure and immediate connect service.

IBM DataPower Gateway Benefits

IBM DataPower Gateway provides many benefits. Some of those benefits include:

Flexibility: The solution is easy to use and configure and provides for a pleasant, intuitive overall user experience. The solution can immediately be used out of the box, which makes overall process management simple.
Protection: The solution provides sturdy continuous service protection and application performance using robust powerful routing and traffic control.
Security: The solution’s enterprise-grade De-Militarized Zone (DMZ) ready gateway enables users to enforce the desired runtime application security across all messaging protocols.
Profitability: The solution’s design ensures significant reduction of development costs in addition to the streamlining of overall operations. Users are able to achieve reduced total cost of ownership (TCO) and experience a near-immediate ROI.

Reviews from Real Users

“My company has a good impression of IBM DataPower Gateway. What I like about it is that because it's an appliance, it's a turnkey solution that's very fast and out of the box. Another valuable feature of IBM DataPower Gateway is that it's easy to integrate with other products.”- Bálint T., Solution Manager at Intalion

“You don't have to have a separate DMC proxy because DataPower Gateway is an appliance and will take care of a lot of security features. These include data validations, encryption, as well as XML or any type of scripting or security threats that are present. From a security point of view, being an appliance in the DMC zone, IBM DataPower Gateway will take care of the entire security angle for the infrastructure.” - Sathyan K., Founder/Director at perfTech Solutions Pvt Ltd

Layer7 API Management is a comprehensive solution that enables organizations to securely expose, manage, and monetize their APIs.

It provides features such as API gateway, developer portal, analytics, and security to ensure seamless integration and control over API traffic.

With Layer7 API Management, businesses can streamline their API operations and drive innovation.

Sample Customers

RBL Bank, Availity

1. IBM 2. Microsoft 3. Oracle 4. Salesforce 5. SAP 6. Cisco 7. Dell 8. HP 9. Adobe 10. VMware 11. Accenture 12. Capgemini 13. Deloitte 14. PwC 15. Ernst & Young 16. Infosys 17. TCS (Tata Consultancy Services) 18. Wipro 19. Cognizant 20. HCL Technologies 21. Tech Mahindra 22. Fujitsu 23. Hitachi 24. NEC 25. NTT Data 26. Ericsson 27. Nokia 28. Siemens 29. AT&T 30. Verizon 31. Vodafone 32. Orange

Buyer's Guide

IBM DataPower Gateway vs. Layer7 API Management

January 2025

Free Report: IBM DataPower Gateway vs. Layer7 API Management

Find out what your peers are saying about IBM DataPower Gateway vs. Layer7 API Management and other solutions. Updated: January 2025.

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