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MicroStrategy vs Oracle Essbase comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive Summary

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

MicroStrategy
Average Rating
8.2
Reviews Sentiment
6.2
Number of Reviews
164
Ranking in other categories
BI (Business Intelligence) Tools (15th), Embedded BI (5th)
Oracle Essbase
Average Rating
8.2
Reviews Sentiment
4.6
Number of Reviews
18
Ranking in other categories
Database Development and Management (12th)
 

Mindshare comparison

MicroStrategy and Oracle Essbase aren’t in the same category and serve different purposes. MicroStrategy is designed for BI (Business Intelligence) Tools and holds a mindshare of 1.2%, down 2.8% compared to last year.
Oracle Essbase, on the other hand, focuses on Database Development and Management, holds 1.4% mindshare, up 0.9% since last year.
BI (Business Intelligence) Tools Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
MicroStrategy1.2%
Microsoft Power BI7.7%
Tableau Enterprise6.2%
Other84.9%
BI (Business Intelligence) Tools
Database Development and Management Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
Oracle Essbase1.4%
Oracle Enterprise Manager4.1%
Redgate SQL Toolbelt Essentials4.1%
Other90.4%
Database Development and Management
 

Featured Reviews

Prabu Thanikchalam - PeerSpot reviewer
Principal Architect & Software Engineering Department Manager at a tech vendor with 10,001+ employees
Reporting has improved with strong administration tools but performance and memory still need work
Compared to the new tools, MicroStrategy is still on the old mechanism, the attributes and metric creations that are still a bit vague compared to other tools. They can actually improve on the go, having derived metrics or derived attributes in MicroStrategy. If they have something like that for the attributes as well, it will be good. A pain point is MicroStrategy memory fluctuations that we couldn't actually read that much. If they can improve that performance, that would be great. MicroStrategy struggles a bit with large data volumes, but they are coming up with new ideas. They have moved to Intelligent Cubes, which can actually handle better data handling. They are coming up with good measures to handle big data.
Bhavya N - PeerSpot reviewer
Senior System Engineer at Infosys
Ensuring efficient data analysis and reporting while identifying areas for calculation and export improvements
The features of Oracle Essbase are valuable, such as its multi-dimensional database used for dynamic calculations and reporting purposes. These features are valuable because they support multi-dimensional data views, allowing users to analyze relationships across various data categories and establish a comprehensive perspective on business operations. Moreover, dynamic calculations allow real-time data analysis, significantly improving the accuracy and depth of financial insights. I have utilized Essbase's data aggregation capabilities. The Oracle Essbase interface provides a good user experience, allowing users to easily navigate and analyze data with fast query performance, effective data visualization tools such as charts, graphs, and tables, and flexibility for customizable analysis and reporting, including the ability to create ad hoc reports. The benefits of the interface include improving productivity and enhancing decision-making.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"This solution is the most scalable BI platform in the world."
"It helps all the store managers and supply chain people to obtain a view of the data and plan the next week, the next month, quarters, and so on."
"The feature I found most valuable is the drop and drag functionality available."
"The most valuable features are the Visual Insights and the visualizations."
"Our BI consultants single out MicroStrategy BI, as the solution proves to be efficient and full of capabilities: large volume data is easy to process, with the capability to tweak the attributes for complex reports and dashboards."
"The scalability is great. It was one of the selling points for us on MicroStrategy."
"I think the total cost of ownership is lower than other products, it is flexible and enterprise class."
"It's user-friendly, also the MTDI cube is a very good approach, as it helps you to use the pre-format instead of using the standard objects from the schema of MicroStrategy."
"Oracle Essbase enables organizations to take their strategic decisions, which helps them make the right decisions at the right time."
"The solution is stable and reliable."
"Its multidimensional analysis is great; unlike relational, where you're linking together multiple tables, with Essbase, you basically define what the dimensions are beforehand, and you define the hierarchy, and then load the data, allowing you to do sophisticated analysis so that you can drill into it and slice and dice the data."
"The solution is scalable."
"Oracle Essbase is a web integration system that integrates with other data systems."
"It provides for faster and more assertive forecast cycles and enables businesses to improve their process since with this tool, you can do things easily and quicker as the business can create more complex models than were possible before."
"It is very fast compared to other normal databases, like SQL and MySQL."
"With Oracle Essbase, everything is centralized in a comprehensive financial statement analysis, allowing for complete management of budget, actuals analysis, and forecast."
 

Cons

"I would try to make it a little more basic, user-friendly. In terms of the UX, it's a bit sluggish there."
"Its price should be lower."
"The solution has a very non-logical user usage part. It has a library mode where users can access all the data, reports, and dashboards, but they also can be accessed from a platform. They have to log into the platform. The user experience is confusing for the users. MicroStrategy needs to define which one they will use. Some functionality isn’t available in library mode but is available in the portal. There should be Office integration. For example, if I do a presentation, then I should be able to add a chart to my presentation."
"I think they're still lacking on customer service. I think historically, MicroStrategy's customer service was a lot better than it is today."
"I would like to see a feature where migrations are easier. When you migrate from certain environments, it could probably be a little cleaner. Sometimes it seems to be somewhat clunky when you migrate from one environment, say a development to a test or production environment."
"I don't think that they will, but I'd like to see parallel processing, scalable parallel processing."
"I think that there are some bugs regarding the design, and some features are a little hidden from the developer."
"MicroStrategy can be very expensive compared to other platforms – at first blush."
"They should improve the solution's performance."
"The consolidation engine, which is HFM or FCCS, needs some room for improvement."
"Variable attributes functionality needs to be incorporated in Planning, though it is available in Essbase I believe it is still not in Planning."
"The solution could enhance business analytics. I delved into the data using Oracle Essbase to create a new support tool."
"The technical support for EPM is bad. I don't remember anytime that the service support helped me in something."
"Sometimes, the current program is slow. They may have to consider the storage and the RAM, increasing the speed and performing the queries at a faster speed."
"The licensing costs are too high."
"It's an expensive product to use."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The licensing is a bit high per user."
"The price was good. We have had great support along the way."
"The pricing is fair."
"Additional costs are associated with maintenance."
"The price of MicroStrategy is reasonable."
"They can improve its licensing. It is a bit expensive as compared to Microsoft and other tools."
"MicroStrategy's licensing cost is higher than that of other tools in the market. My company uses the enterprise edition of the product."
"For larger businesses, the pricing is logical."
"The solution is expensive."
"It is a costly solution."
"I believe the licensing is on a monthly base."
"Essbase is competitively priced."
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Comparison Review

it_user6330 - PeerSpot reviewer
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…
 

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
15%
Construction Company
10%
Marketing Services Firm
8%
Outsourcing Company
7%
Financial Services Firm
17%
Construction Company
8%
Manufacturing Company
7%
Insurance Company
6%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business37
Midsize Enterprise26
Large Enterprise102
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business4
Midsize Enterprise1
Large Enterprise14
 

Questions from the Community

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for MicroStrategy?
I would say on a scale of 1 to 10, I have only a four when it comes to pricing and setup cost because in my earlier companies, everything was done by another team. Here, we actually handle some of ...
What needs improvement with MicroStrategy?
Compared to the new tools, MicroStrategy is still on the old mechanism, the attributes and metric creations that are still a bit vague compared to other tools. They can actually improve on the go, ...
What is your primary use case for MicroStrategy?
MicroStrategy is basically a reporting tool, and I take care of the administration side, so I handle complete maintenance and administration of MicroStrategy servers across all environments. Day-to...
What needs improvement with Oracle Essbase?
A significant area for improvement in Oracle Essbase is that financial statement analysis, CAPEX and OPEX analysis, and financial consolidation must be done manually, as Oracle Essbase doesn't incl...
What is your primary use case for Oracle Essbase?
The initial setup of Oracle Essbase is dependent on whether you select BSO or ASO cubes. First, you need to set up the type of information and once the type of cubes is defined, you need to define ...
What advice do you have for others considering Oracle Essbase?
The pricing functionality in Oracle Essbase is handled through the model you develop, where each cube can be customized with members and dimensions for pricing and entities. You can implement any f...
 

Also Known As

No data available
Essbase
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

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.
CHU de Rennes, Bellco Credit Union, Akindo Sushiro Co. Ltd, Deutsche Telekom AG, Samarco MineraÊo S.A., PCCW Ltd., QDQ media S.A.U., Boiron Italia, Specialized Bicycle Components Inc., Akindo Sushiro Co. Ltd., Air Canada, Daelim Industrial Co. Ltd.
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