Informatica PowerCenter vs StreamSets comparison

Informatica and IBM are both solutions in the Data Integration category. Informatica is ranked #2 with an average rating of 8.0, while IBM is ranked #9 with an average rating of 8.4. Informatica holds a 11.0% mindshare in DI, compared to IBM’s 1.8% mindshare. Additionally, 91% of Informatica users are willing to recommend the solution, compared to 100% of IBM users who would recommend it.

Informatica PowerCenter

Read 80 Informatica PowerCenter reviews

19,173 Views
16,406 Comparison Views

91% willing to recommend

StreamSets

Read 22 StreamSets reviews

2,905 Views
1,916 Comparison Views

100% willing to recommend

Informatica PowerCenter

StreamSets

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Executive SummaryUpdated on Dec 19, 2024

Informatica PowerCenter and StreamSets compete in the data integration platform category. StreamSets has the upper hand due to its flexibility and modern feature set.

Features: Informatica PowerCenter offers robust ETL capabilities, scalability for large enterprises, and excellent structured data processing. StreamSets provides real-time data flow monitoring, ease of use, and versatile handling of unstructured data.

Room for Improvement: Informatica PowerCenter could improve by reducing deployment complexity, streamlining cloud integration, and enhancing user interface modernity. StreamSets might work on extending support for legacy systems, enhancing transformation capabilities for complex data, and optimizing its error handling processes.

Ease of Deployment and Customer Service: StreamSets offers agile deployment with cloud-native architecture easing implementation. Informatica PowerCenter requires more resources for deployment due to legacy complexity. Both deliver competent customer support, but StreamSets provides a more streamlined experience.

Pricing and ROI: StreamSets typically provides competitive pricing with subscription models, offering quicker ROI through lower upfront costs and scalability. Informatica PowerCenter may have higher setup expenses, but it can deliver substantial long-term ROI for large organizations.

To learn more, read our detailed Informatica PowerCenter vs. StreamSets Report (Updated: November 2024).

Buyer's Guide

Informatica PowerCenter vs. StreamSets

November 2024

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Categories and Ranking

Informatica PowerCenter

Ranking in Data Integration

2nd

Average Rating

8.0

Reviews Sentiment

6.9

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

Data Visualization (8th)

StreamSets

Ranking in Data Integration

9th

Average Rating

8.4

Reviews Sentiment

7.1

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

No ranking in other categories

Mindshare comparison

As of December 2024, in the Data Integration category, the mindshare of Informatica PowerCenter is 11.0%, up from 10.1% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of StreamSets is 1.8%, up from 1.4% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.

Data Integration

Featured Reviews

Lars Borchers

Senior BI Backend Developer at ALD Automotive Portugal

A stable and reliable product that provides a variety of features for data integration

The solution is not for newcomers. It has an old touch. The solution must improve the integration with new services. It was part of the program at Informatica when they moved to their cloud platform. It is integrated. However, from an on-premise perspective, we need to buy licenses for PowerExchange. If we want a native driver to access a special service, we need to extend our license to those services. It is expensive. I don't like that it's not all included in the solution.

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Reyansh Kumar

Technical Specialist at Accenture

We no longer need to hire highly skilled data engineers to create and monitor data pipelines

The things I like about StreamSets are its * overall user interface * efficiency * product features, which are all good. Also, the scheduling within the data engineering pipeline is very much appreciated, and it has a wide range of connectors for connecting to any data sources like SQL Server, AWS, Azure, etc. We have used it with Kafka, Hadoop, and Azure Data Factory Datasets. Connecting to these systems with StreamSets is very easy. You just need to configure the data sources, the paths and their configurations, and you are ready to go. It is very efficient and very easy to use for ETL pipelines. It is a GUI-based interface in which you can easily create or design your own data pipelines with just a few clicks. As for moving data into modern analytics systems, we are using it with Microsoft Power BI, AWS, and some on-premises solutions, and it is very easy to get data from StreamSets into them. No hardcore coding or special technical expertise is required. It is also a no-code platform in which you can configure your data sources and data output for easy configuration of your data pipeline. This is a very important aspect because if a tool requires code development, we need to hire software developers to get the task done. By using StreamSets, it can be done with a few clicks.

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Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"The ability to scale through partitions helped us to improve the performance."

"The performance and design of Informatica have been very valuable. I find the performance faster than, say, Oracle Data Integrator or DataStage."

"The most valuable feature of Informatica PowerCenter is data transformation and user-friendliness."

"The technical support is excellent."

"The number of docs has been reduced drastically, which is very good."

"Good interface, reasonable documentation."

"The support is valuable. There are also open-source ETL products, which work very well, but there is no support. When we face a production problem, being able to get support is valuable, and it brings efficiency. With an open-source solution, we can't engage anyone to resolve the problem as quickly as possible."

"It is UI friendly and has all the advantages of an ETL tool."

More Informatica PowerCenter pros

"Also, the intuitive canvas for designing all the streams in the pipeline, along with the simplicity of the entire product are very big pluses for me. The software is very simple and straightforward. That is something that is needed right now."

"The most valuable feature is the pipelines because they enable us to pull in and push out data from different sources and to manipulate and clean things up within them."

"StreamSets’ data drift resilience has reduced the time it takes us to fix data drift breakages. For example, in our previous Hadoop scenario, when we were creating the Sqoop-based processes to move data from source to destinations, we were getting the job done. That took approximately an hour to an hour and a half when we did it with Hadoop. However, with the StreamSets, since it works on a data collector-based mechanism, it completes the same process in 15 minutes of time. Therefore, it has saved us around 45 minutes per data pipeline or table that we migrate. Thus, it reduced the data transfer, including the drift part, by 45 minutes."

"I really appreciate the numerous ready connectors available on both the source and target sides, the support for various media file formats, and the ease of configuring and managing pipelines centrally."

"One of the things I like is the data pipelines. They have a very good design. Implementing pipelines is very straightforward. It doesn't require any technical skill."

"The most valuable features are the option of integration with a variety of protocols, languages, and origins."

"In StreamSets, everything is in one place."

"The scheduling within the data engineering pipeline is very much appreciated, and it has a wide range of connectors for connecting to any data sources like SQL Server, AWS, Azure, etc. We have used it with Kafka, Hadoop, and Azure Data Factory Datasets. Connecting to these systems with StreamSets is very easy."

More StreamSets pros

Cons

"The only problem with this product is the level of complexity with the number of levels of transformation that you have to go through."

"It would be good to recreate the entire interface to make it easier for users to build workflows."

"When I deal with very large amounts of data, there have been performance issues."

"The multiple interfaces in Informatica PowerCenter are not great for the user experience. Because of this, I think it can cause confusion for any beginner developer."

"I found it is kind of weird that not all of the mapping changes are treated as true changes."

"While Informatica is great for data-integration, it does not have any analytics features. Thus, organizations have to always look for another product for their BI needs."

"Informatica PowerCenter is outdated and would benefit from modernization. They should have a very good migration strategy from Informatica PowerCenter to AACF. Informatica PowerCenter there is no point in using it, you have to use a cloud version."

"Support could be better."

More Informatica PowerCenter cons

"There aren't enough hands-on labs, and debugging is also an issue because it takes a lot of time. Logs are not that clear when you are debugging, and you can only select a single source for a pipeline."

"The logging mechanism could be improved. If I am working on a pipeline, then create a job out of it and it is running, it will generate constant logs. So, the logging mechanism could be simplified. Now, it is a bit difficult to understand and filter the logs. It takes some time."

"One thing that I would like to add is the ability to manually enter data. The way the solution currently works is we don't have the option to manually change the data at any point in time. Being able to do that will allow us to do everything that we want to do with our data. Sometimes, we need to manually manipulate the data to make it more accurate in case our prior bifurcation filters are not good. If we have the option to manually enter the data or make the exact iterations on the data set, that would be a good thing."

"Currently, we can only use the query to read data from SAP HANA. What we would like to see, as soon as possible, is the ability to read from multiple tables from SAP HANA. That would be a really good thing that we could use immediately. For example, if you have 100 tables in SQL Server or Oracle, then you could just point it to the schema or the 100 tables and ingestion information. However, you can't do that in SAP HANA since StreamSets currently is lacking in this. They do not have a multi-table feature for SAP HANA. Therefore, a multi-table origin for SAP HANA would be helpful."

"We often faced problems, especially with SAP ERP. We struggled because many columns weren't integers or primary keys, which StreamSets couldn't handle. We had to restructure our data tables, which was painful. Also, pipeline failures were common, and data drifting wasn't addressed, which made things worse. Licensing was another issue we encountered."

"The data collector in StreamSets has to be designed properly. For example, a simple database configuration with MySQL DB requires the MySQL Connector to be installed."

"If you use JDBC Lookup, for example, it generally takes a long time to process data."

"They need to improve their customer care services. Sometimes it has taken more than 48 hours to resolve an issue. That should be reduced. They are aware of small or generic issues, but not the more technical or deep issues. For those, they require some time, generally 48 to 72 hours to respond. That should be improved."

More StreamSets cons

Pricing and Cost Advice

"It's much more expensive, almost three times more expensive than most other solutions."

"Price-wise, it's more expensive than SSIS, but it's a better tool, so it has more features. Licensing is on a yearly basis."

"I rate the product's price a ten on a scale of one to ten, where one is a low price, and ten is a high price."

"The pricing for Informatica PowerCenter is expensive. Some clients have simple needs and only want to integrate and store data. Some clients have small needs, while some clients have bigger needs and focus more on performance and time. The licensing cost for Informatica PowerCenter isn't good. In my project, if I remember correctly, the company pays €20,000 per year for the Informatica PowerCenter license. I'm not aware of additional costs that you need to pay for some features of the solution. On a scale of one to five, I'm rating its price a three."

"Licensing is a one time cost. But maintenance costs depend on what you want, how long you need it. Maintenance is a kind of insurance. With health insurance, you don't know whether you will get sick or need to go to hospital or not but you have to have insurance. It's the same thing with support. If you have that expertise in resolving issues, if you have enough experience in your IT department, I would say you don't need the support. But in practice, they recommend you go with the support. If you want support you have to pay for it."

"We have a site license, but we do pay by the division."

"A basic setup can be from $100,000 and up annually."

"The pricing is a little expensive, but in the same range as IBM and other competitors."

More Informatica PowerCenter pricing and cost advice

"The licensing is expensive, and there are other costs involved too. I know from using the software that you have to buy new features whenever there are new updates, which I don't really like. But initially, it was very good."

"I believe the pricing is not equitable."

"Its pricing is pretty much up to the mark. For smaller enterprises, it could be a big price to pay at the initial stage of operations, but the moment you have the Seed B or Seed C funding and you want to scale up your operations and aren't much worried about the funds, at that point in time, you would need a solution that could be scaled."

"There are two editions, Professional and Enterprise, and there is a free trial. We're using the Professional edition and it is competitively priced."

"StreamSets Data Collector is open source. One can utilize the StreamSets Data Collector, but the Control Hub is the main repository where all the jobs are present. Everything happens in Control Hub."

"The pricing is affordable for any business."

"We are running the community version right now, which can be used free of charge."

"It's not expensive because you pay per month, and the tasks you can perform with it are huge. It's reliable and cost-effective."

More StreamSets pricing and cost advice

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Comparison Review

it_user90069

BI Expert at a healthcare company with 1,001-5,000 employees

Feb 20, 2014

Informatica PowerCenter vs. Microsoft SSIS - each technology has its advantages but also have similarities

Technology has made it easier for businesses to organize and manipulate data to get a clearer picture of what’s going on with their business. Notably, ETL tools have made managing huge amounts of data significantly easier and faster, boosting many organizations’ business intelligence operations…

Read full review

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Financial Services Firm

18%

Computer Software Company

12%

Manufacturing Company

Insurance Company

Financial Services Firm

17%

Computer Software Company

10%

Manufacturing Company

10%

Insurance Company

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

Questions from the Community

How does Azure Data Factory compare with Informatica PowerCenter?

Azure Data Factory is flexible, modular, and works well. In terms of cost, it is not too pricey. It offers the stability and reliability I am looking for, good scalability, and is easy to set up an...

See all answers

Which is better - SSIS or Informatica PowerCenter?

SSIS PowerPack is a group of drag and drop connectors for Microsoft SQL Server Integration Services, commonly called SSIS. The collection helps organizations boost productivity with code-free compo...

See all answers

Which Informatica product would you choose - PowerCenter or Cloud Data Integration?

Complex transformations can easily be achieved using PowerCenter, which has all the features and tools to establish a real data governance strategy. Additionally, PowerCenter is able to manage huge...

See all answers

What do you like most about StreamSets?

The best thing about StreamSets is its plugins, which are very useful and work well with almost every data source. It's also easy to use, especially if you're comfortable with SQL. You can customiz...

See all answers

What needs improvement with StreamSets?

We often faced problems, especially with SAP ERP. We struggled because many columns weren't integers or primary keys, which StreamSets couldn't handle. We had to restructure our data tables, which ...

See all answers

What is your primary use case for StreamSets?

StreamSets is used for data transformation rather than ETL processes. It focuses on transforming data directly from sources without handling the extraction part of the process. The transformed data...

See all answers

Comparisons

SSIS vs Informatica PowerCenter

Compared 16% of the time

Azure Data Factory vs Informatica PowerCenter

Compared 14% of the time

Databricks vs Informatica PowerCenter

Compared 13% of the time

Informatica Intelligent Data Management Cloud (IDMC) vs Informatica PowerCenter

Compared 9% of the time

Tableau vs Informatica PowerCenter

Compared 2% of the time

More Informatica PowerCenter Competitors

IBM InfoSphere DataStage vs StreamSets

Compared 10% of the time

Fivetran vs StreamSets

Compared 10% of the time

webMethods.io vs StreamSets

Compared 8% of the time

Azure Data Factory vs StreamSets

Compared 8% of the time

SSIS vs StreamSets

Compared 5% of the time

More StreamSets Competitors

Product Reports

Buyer's Guide

Informatica PowerCenter

December 2024

Download Informatica PowerCenter product report

Buyer's Guide

StreamSets

November 2024

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Also Known As

PowerCenter

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Informatica

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IBM

Overview

Informatica PowerCenter is a data integration and data visualization tool. The solution works as an enterprise data integration platform that helps organizations access, transform, and integrate data from various systems. The product is designed to support companies in the full cycle of a project, from its initial rollout to critical deployments. Informatica PowerCenter allows developers and analysts to collaborate while accelerating the work process to deploy projects within days instead of months.

The Advanced edition of the product provides an additional real-time engine which allows companies to have always-on enterprise data integration. This ensures seamless collaboration and increment of data lineage visibility and impacts analysis.

The Premium edition of the solution offers an early warning system that detects unexpected behaviors or incorrect utilization of resources in the workflows and alerts companies in the case that these occur. This version of the product also offers automatic data validation, which ensures data accuracy and reduces testing time and expenditure of resources for by up to 90%.

Informatica PowerCenter Features

The product provides users with various features which allow them to execute data integration initiatives such as analytics, data warehousing, data governance, consolidation, and application migration. The features of the solution include:

Collaboration: Informatica PowerCenter offers role-based tools and processes which enable business self-service while benefiting from high-quality IT resources.
Automation: Through various automations and easy-to-use software, users can utilize graphical and codeless tools and initiate effective data integration without additional knowledge.
Scalability: The tool provides high scalability to users, which ensures seamless performance and minimum downtime. PowerCenter also has adaptive load balancing, pushdown optimization, and dynamic partitioning.
Monitoring: Through the extensive monitoring feature, the operations and governance of the solution are easily overseen by users. The tool also provides alerts that can prevent damage to the system.
Real-time data: Through real-time data, users can monitor applications and analytics, ensuring their efficient operation.
Prototyping: Informatica lets its users collaborate with information technology to prototype, profile, and validate results in a timely manner.
Connectivity: Users can access and integrate data from different types of sources through high-performance connectors.
Automated data validation testing: The product offers script-free automated and repeatable audit and validation of data.
Data transformation: This feature allows users to use comprehensive parsing of JSON, PDF, XML, Microsoft Office, and the Internet of Things (IoT) for non-relation data.
Cloud applications connectivity: The product allows for seamless connection to cloud application sources and targets.

Informatica PowerCenter Benefits

The benefits of using Informatica PowerCenter include:

The tool can work over a wide range of systems and platforms and also allows for lean integration.
It enhances the quality and speed of performance and optimizes the cost of the process for your organization.
PowerCenter supports multiple databases, including TPump, Parallel Transporter Fastload, and Teradata MLoad.
The tool is very easy to monitor and maintain, which simplifies the data integration process for companies.
The centralized error logging system allows users to locate errors in a timely manner and correct them.
The tool can convert data from an application to another format, as it serves as one of the most powerful data transformation solutions.
PowerCenter can also serve as middleware between two applications.
The solution offers both parallel processing and load balancing.
PowerCenter is a tool with a high level of security, which also minimizes essential administration activities.
The solution ensures the quality of information, as it does not allow invalid or unwanted data to be uploaded to the source.

Reviews from Real Users

Yahya T., a developer and architect at L'Oreal, says the product is stable, provides good support, and integrating it with other systems is very fast.

Mohamed E., a senior manager for Data management and data governance at a tech company, says PowerCenter is stable, mature, and offers flexibility in building the pipeline and has a drag-and-drop mode because it's GUI-based; technical support is brilliant.

StreamSets is a data integration platform that enables organizations to efficiently move and process data across various systems. It offers a user-friendly interface for designing, deploying, and managing data pipelines, allowing users to easily connect to various data sources and destinations. StreamSets also provides real-time monitoring and alerting capabilities, ensuring that data is flowing smoothly and any issues are quickly addressed.

Sample Customers

University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center, LexisNexis, Rabobank

Availity, BT Group, Humana, Deluxe, GSK, RingCentral, IBM, Shell, SamTrans, State of Ohio, TalentFulfilled, TechBridge

Buyer's Guide

Informatica PowerCenter vs. StreamSets

November 2024

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