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IBM Tivoli NetCool OMNIbus vs ServiceNow IT Operations Management comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Jan 23, 2025

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 Tivoli NetCool OMNIbus
Ranking in Event Monitoring
3rd
Average Rating
7.4
Reviews Sentiment
7.2
Number of Reviews
14
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
ServiceNow IT Operations Ma...
Ranking in Event Monitoring
1st
Average Rating
8.2
Reviews Sentiment
6.8
Number of Reviews
40
Ranking in other categories
Cloud Management (9th), IT Infrastructure Monitoring (11th), AIOps (4th)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of March 2025, in the Event Monitoring category, the mindshare of IBM Tivoli NetCool OMNIbus is 9.2%, up from 8.8% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of ServiceNow IT Operations Management is 19.3%, up from 15.0% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Event Monitoring
 

Featured Reviews

Ahmed Salman - PeerSpot reviewer
Aids in network performance monitoring and management
I am working as a customer, mainly using IntelliQ and another product, IBM NetCool, Watson AI. These products are used for monitoring network performance and management.  The primary use case involves network performance monitoring, and it is compatible only with IBM DB2 IBM Tivoli NetCool…
RichardG - PeerSpot reviewer
Effortlessly blends management systems for comprehensive infrastructure insight
ServiceNow IT Operations Management brought together Intune and SCCM or MECM really well. It provided out-of-the-box integrations, requiring only minimal effort, typically a couple of days, to massage those systems into a seamless operation. Additionally, the performance analytics of ServiceNow was especially beneficial for setting thresholds, aggregating, and correlating infrastructure data.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"The biggest plus points for me are the configurability and scalability of the solution, as well as the multi-tenancy of the platform."
"Probes are the best feature because they are well written which rarely requires you to write additional rules. These probes monitor activity within your environment."
"IBM Tivoli NetCool OMNIbus supports legacy protocols like CORBA, Huawei, and other telecom protocols, which I find beneficial."
"It is customer-centric. Customers can access the event list from their location or desktop and view the event. There is no need to go and connect to any other server and run events to have a view of all the events happening in the environment. We get a good response from customers about this feature and the main architecture of NetCool. Its processing is very good. Deduplication and correlation functionalities are good in this solution as compared to other solutions. A big advantage of NetCool is that it also supports multi-layered protocols. We can receive multiple events from different protocols like UDP, HTTP, and those events can be captured in NetCool."
"It's good for managed systems. The end query on the user interface is good. You can view lots of charts and graphs."
"The monitoring is the solution's most valuable feature."
"It is an easy-to-use solution."
"Offers very good event/alert drill-down and statistical reporting capabilities."
"It is a stable solution. I have not experienced any system outages during my time using the solution."
"Provides everything in one solution."
"I like the tool's discovery feature."
"The auto remediation feature has been most valuable. They have also introduced an AOP feature of ServiceNow that we are keen to explore."
"The asset management tools are very valuable."
"The Discovery feature is the most valuable. I only use the Discovery and Service Mapping features. I am using the minor subscription called ITOM Visibility, which includes the Discovery and Service Mapping features. It is easy to understand and easy to use. It has a lot of documentation. You can find a lot of help online, which helps me in finding what I need in a rapid way. You can find videos on YouTube channels and a lot of stuff and information in the online community."
"ServiceNow IT Operations Management is a stable product."
"The solution is saving time by providing templates, reducing duplication in rule configuration, and offering efficient alert management."
 

Cons

"Its technical support team takes longer to reply."
"Its integration could be better. They should provide an easier integration for all the monitoring stuff, and it will make things easier for us. Currently, there is a complexity in integrating it with a vendor application, and we have to use another tool to integrate it with a vendor application. To integrate some applications with NetCool, I need to install an IBM tool on top of it. It would be good if they can provide an API or any kind of interface that we can leverage while developing a new protocol interface or application. We should be able to use an API or interface with NetCool. Its GUI can also be better. As compared to other tools, it is not user friendly, and it is not easy to do stuff through GUI. Whenever we do anything on the GUI, it takes time. They need to focus on the GUI part, especially the dashboard. They should focus on how users can effectively drill down from one box to another. The visual appeal of the dashboard is as important as the data and functionality."
"The solution needs to invest in the development of a knowledge base and use of AI services for providing event resolution and intervention directions."
"The solution has limitations in database integration as it cannot integrate with databases other than IBM DB2."
"They could enhance the visibility to give us a unified view of our entire IT infrastructure."
"The web portal and typical event controls are a little outdated."
"Areas that could be better include the fact that the solution is only on-premises, lacks AI capabilities, and support response times could be quicker."
"I would like for the next release to be more user-friendly and out of date. The next release should focus on the cloud, AI, and ML technologies."
"ServiceNow IT Operations Management could do a little bit better with integrations. Integrating ServiceNow IT Operations Management with CMDB processes needs a little more work."
"ServiceNow could be more prescriptive on how customers can leverage some of the benefits."
"The most complaints we have received from our clients are the solution's discovery aspect. I've heard a few concerns from the customers where we have to integrate with a third-party tool to make a full-fledged discovery along with ServiceNow. ServiceNow alone does not do the total capacity of the discovery. The discovery portion of ServiceNow IT Operations Management is not in-depth as what the customers are looking for. The information that it gathers from the assets is a little more limited than what other tools provide."
"The pricing is high."
"The pricing of some modules is higher because they are sold in packages. If we need something specific, we cannot take it individually."
"At times, it got cumbersome from the project management perspective. It could have been because of the way we were using it. I found Microsoft Project to be more extensive and robust than ITOM."
"The licensing model of the product is a bit rigid, and it can be a bit difficult to downscale if your needs change while also being expensive."
"Lacks the ability to do its own monitoring."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"Its license cost is a little bit more than other solutions. Our customers expect a standard market price that is comparative to other products. For each and every NetCool OMNIbus component, we have to purchase a separate license. These components are not free with the product."
"It is a costly solution."
"You have to have the right level of budget to afford this solution."
"It is expensive. It is around 10 Euros per server per month."
"The pricing is high and may be excluding the small to medium-sized enterprise businesses."
"I would rate the product's pricing a five out of ten since there are vendors who are cheaper."
"The price of ServiceNow IT Operations Management is expensive."
"We obtained discovery licenses at about seven dollars Australian per unit, which we found to be reasonable and competitive."
"ServiceNow IT Operations Management is a costly solution. I'd rate the price at ten, on a scale from one to ten with one being the lowest and ten being the highest price. Some clients do have a problem with the price, but most find that the solution is worth the cost."
"It is moderately expensive. The pricing itself and the licensing options are depending on the model and the customization."
"It has different subscription models."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
24%
Computer Software Company
18%
Energy/Utilities Company
8%
Manufacturing Company
6%
Financial Services Firm
15%
Computer Software Company
14%
Manufacturing Company
11%
Government
6%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about IBM Tivoli NetCool OMNIbus?
The biggest plus points for me are the configurability and scalability of the solution, as well as the multi-tenancy of the platform.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for IBM Tivoli NetCool OMNIbus?
If the various HW elements are from the same vendor, a monitoring solution provided by that vendor or its partners will potentially result in lower licensing and operational costs. Moreover, for ve...
What needs improvement with IBM Tivoli NetCool OMNIbus?
IBM is working on converting NetCool to NetCool Operations Insight, which runs on Watson AI. There were areas needing improvement in terms of AI, however, they have migrated the entire NetCool suit...
What do you like most about ServiceNow IT Operations Management?
From my perspective as an asset manager, the most valuable feature of the solution is the configuration management portion, where I can actively add something to the database.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for ServiceNow IT Operations Management?
We obtained discovery licenses at about seven dollars Australian per unit, which we found to be reasonable and competitive. The pricing model offers scaling where not everything consumes a license ...
What needs improvement with ServiceNow IT Operations Management?
There is room for improvement in service mapping within ServiceNow ITOM. When we have more time, we'll look to extend that and apply it to business-critical services like email.
 

Also Known As

Tivoli NetCool OMNIbus
ServiceNow ITOM
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Consolidated Communications, €sterreichische Bundesbahnen (€BB), Capgemini
servicenow, TransAlta, NATS, Symantec
Find out what your peers are saying about IBM Tivoli NetCool OMNIbus vs. ServiceNow IT Operations Management and other solutions. Updated: March 2025.
842,592 professionals have used our research since 2012.