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Informatica PowerCenter vs WhereScape RED comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Dec 19, 2024

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

Informatica PowerCenter
Ranking in Data Integration
2nd
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
6.9
Number of Reviews
80
Ranking in other categories
Data Visualization (8th)
WhereScape RED
Ranking in Data Integration
47th
Average Rating
8.2
Reviews Sentiment
7.2
Number of Reviews
15
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of February 2025, in the Data Integration category, the mindshare of Informatica PowerCenter is 10.3%, down from 12.1% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of WhereScape RED is 1.0%, up from 0.9% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Data Integration
 

Featured Reviews

Lars Borchers - PeerSpot reviewer
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.
it_user584544 - PeerSpot reviewer
The ​architecture is based on metadata and documentation is automated.
I would love to see a GUI interface for defining dependencies between build processes. RED provides a spreadsheet like interface for defining the dependencies between builds. Once the dependencies are defined, RED can produce a nice dependency diagram to give a visualization of the dependency tree. It would be easier to define complex dependency relationships if the dependency diagram were interactive. Our legacy ETL tool provided this GUI dependency definition via a drag and drop diagram which was very useful. The solution provided by WhereScape does work, and the dependency diagrams generated are helpful. It would just be nice to have the ability to define dependencies via a diagram, since dependencies relationships are much easier to understand via a diagram.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"What I like most about Informatica PowerCenter is that it's the best tool in the market for data integration. Currently, I work in L'Oréal, where a new system from SAP is used. Informatica PowerCenter integration with SAP is very, very fast and very, very simple, so you have the server flow from SAP, and through Informatica PowerCenter, you can ingest the data and make that data available for the business more quickly."
"The most complex task, in this case, was to read and transform BLOB data, and Java transformation in Informatica Power Center was a great solution."
"PowerCenter performs well during data transformation and optimization."
"The product's initial setup phase is very easy."
"The most valuable aspects of Informatica PowerCenter are the many features, ease of use, and user-friendliness."
"Deployment was simple and straightforward."
"The most valuable features are the metadata repository and the data warehouse application console."
"Ease and speed of building integrations, especially integrations between different applications, such as our Hospital Information System."
"The most valuable feature is the metadata generated code."
"Data transformations and rollups are easy to accomplish."
"RED has provided us the ability to integrate, stage, and transform data from diverse sources into an enterprise-grade data warehouse which meets the needs of my organization, but it also enables us to easily and quickly make ETL or DW changes."
"WhereScape RED has improved our business's ability to generate needed reporting without requiring a large team of developers to manually code all of the necessary plumbing."
"WhereScape's deployment package is a fantastic feature. The application allows for selecting specific objects that you would like to deploy from one environment to another rather than deploying the entire database."
"This is a fantastically robust DW tool that will make you at least 10 times faster in producing a DW."
"I like the data vault implementations."
"The tool supports multiple target update methods."
 

Cons

"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."
"The performance of Informatica PowerCenter could improve."
"While on-premises is a better product, we really need to move to the cloud and need the cloud to be as robust as this product."
"Requires an established data center because there is no option for software as a service."
"PowerCenter has three clients. I wish they would consolidate everything into one GUI, not three. Also, we had a persistent issue with the Informatica Developer tool but it was solved when we migrated to the newest one."
"The documentation could be improved."
"Informatica PowerCenter could improve by having a single interface because half of the system is still in the legacy interface and many other elements are moved to the developer client. It would be good if there was a single interface for the end user and developers."
"I would like to see it be able to import data from NoSQL."
"The ability to execute SSIS projects within WhereScape would be nice because we have a lot of packages that are too cumbersome to recreate."
"They need a more robust support center. It has been a bit difficult to find solutions to problems that are out-of-the-box."
"Jobs cannot be deleted via the deployment package. When deploying from dev to QA or production, a job has to be retired. The job has to be manually removed from the target environment."
"Improve the object renaming ability (it works, but it could be more automated)."
"No support for change data capture or delta detection - that must be custom coded ."
"It could use a tool to diagnose what is missing from the environment for WhereScape to install successfully."
"Project-based searching of data objects in the data warehouse browser needs to be improved."
"Customization could be better."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"According to what I've heard and read on various blogs, it's quite expensive when compared to similar competitive products."
"Since the solution's cost is higher, I rate the pricing as a five out of ten."
"The price is mostly reasonable."
"A basic setup can be from $100,000 and up annually."
"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."
"I consider this to be an expensive product."
"Its licensing is expensive in terms of scaling."
"I rate the solution's pricing a four out of ten. The price is very high, and it doesn't understand the market now."
"ROI is at least 10 times."
"Speed to market of a warehouse solution at a relatively inexpensive price point."
"Factor in the price of specialized consulting who know this product. They're hard to find and expensive."
"Our company purchased a corporate unlimited license."
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Comparison Review

it_user90069 - PeerSpot reviewer
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…
 

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
18%
Computer Software Company
12%
Manufacturing Company
7%
Government
7%
Financial Services Firm
20%
Insurance Company
9%
Computer Software Company
9%
Healthcare Company
8%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

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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...
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...
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Also Known As

PowerCenter
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Overview

 

Sample Customers

University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center, LexisNexis, Rabobank
British American Tobacco, Cornell University, Allianz Benelux, Finnair, Solarwinds and many more.
Find out what your peers are saying about Informatica PowerCenter vs. WhereScape RED and other solutions. Updated: February 2025.
832,765 professionals have used our research since 2012.