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IBM Cognos vs NetSuite Business Intelligence comparison

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IBM Cognos
Read 132 IBM Cognos reviews
9,140 views|5,304 comparisons
91% willing to recommend
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NetSuite Business Intelligence
Read 1 NetSuite Business Intelligence review
354 views|294 comparisons
100% willing to recommend
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Buyer's Guide
BI (Business Intelligence) Tools
May 2024
Executive Summary

We performed a comparison between IBM Cognos and NetSuite Business Intelligence based on real PeerSpot user reviews.

Find out what your peers are saying about Microsoft, Tableau, Oracle and others in BI (Business Intelligence) Tools.
To learn more, read our detailed BI (Business Intelligence) Tools Report (Updated: May 2024).
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771,170 professionals have used our research since 2012.
Featured Review
KARTHIKEYAN THANGARASU
A strong reporting tool with good dashboard functionality, but lacking a configurable UI
This solution has provided us with a single control tool, which allows us to easily provide reports for the different sections of our banking... Read more →
Antonio Lira
Scripting is a great feature as is the ability to export almost anything
Quotes From Members
We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use.
Here are some excerpts of what they said:
Pros
"We use IBM Cognos for enterprise analytics and reporting.""Cognos' most valuable features are the bundled studios, simple UI, and advanced features like the ability to create data modules.""It is a stable product.""Using custom controls, it is possible to extend the application with even more functionality and make the application intuitive and attractive.""We use the account statement report. When you use an account in HSBC, you receive various types of accounts, such as the stock market, fixed accounts, credit cards, and business accounts. We can create one consolidated report called CCS support, which includes all these accounts. In that statement, we are consolidating all those accounts.""The dashboarding offered by this solution is very valuable to us.""Cognos is the best application with dashboards,batch reporting, jobs, events and ad-hoc reporting for business users.""Self-service is possible through the use of dashboards, which are also very intuitive. Stories can be used to pin snapshots, tell the story for meetings, etc."

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"You can export almost anything whether it's graphics or data."

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Cons
"Cognos is quite slow - it's missing the performance of the PowerPlay cubes.""IBM Cognos's error messages seem to be a bit ambiguous. An error will be encountered and a message will be sent out very ambiguous and after investigating the error message it could be any number of issues. There was never a direct answer to the question or a direct answer to the error messages. Sometimes it would be a generic error message for 21 different solutions. It wasn't very specific, which required a lot of digging around and trial and error trying to fix the problem. The messaging in their error messaging is something needing improvement.""The tool needs to improve the connectivity since I see that, at times, there is a need to increase the memory in the database.""I don't like that when we use Colab packages, we get less functionality. For example, you can make groups of data with Excel or with the data sets from the packages, but when you use the Colab packages directly, you can only group the data when you analyze it with Analysis Studio. I think Cognos needs to improve more on this functionality.""This product could use improvement in terms of usability for those with less technical know how.""I think the GIS pieces maybe not as good as we would like.""One key area for improvement is the need to improve the self-service nature and functionality of the product in terms of visual analytics.""The visualization aspect needs to be improved and I believe, this is being resolved in upcoming versions."

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"Graphics are limited and could be improved."

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Pricing and Cost Advice
  • "There is need to assess the purchase license accordingly so as to avoid audit penalties."
  • "The pricing and licensing policies are comparatively cheaper than other products in the market ."
  • "IBM Cognos offers competitive pricing similar to other BI vendors in the market."
  • "Pricing should be improved."
  • "The pricing of this product is meant for medium to large-scale enterprises."
  • "It is my understanding that the cost is very low. It's not very expensive."
  • "Cognos is super expensive compared to Tableau ($70/month) and Power BI ($20/month) — I think Cognos is roughly $200 a month."
  • "It is quite pricy. I think Microsoft BI is cheaper. Tableau might also be cheaper, but it also depends on the usage. If you have very many users, Cognos can be a problem. It could be cheaper than Tableau but not for so many users. If you have a few thousand users, Tableau, which is generally quite expensive, can be cheaper than Cognos."

    • More IBM Cognos Pricing and Cost Advice →

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    Comparison Review
    Anonymous User
    Comparison of SAP BO, Tableau, QlikView, Cognos, Microsoft, OBIEE and Pentaho

    Valuable Features

    1. SAP BO/BI Enterprise scalability Security Ease of use Semantic layer 2. Tableau Visualization Data discovery Turnaround time 3. IBM Cognos Enterprise scalability Security In-memory feature 4. MS BI - Flexibility 5. Pentaho - Open source but still enterprise grade 6. QlikView Data visualization Turnaround time. 7. OBIEE Enterprise security Semantic model

    Room for Improvement

    1. SAP BO/BI Visualization 2. Tableau Scalability 3. IBM Cognos Ease of use 4. MS BI Visualization Ease of use 5. Pentaho Ease of use Semantic layer 6. QlikView Scalability 7. OBIEE Visualization Database connectivities

    Use of Solution

    I have used SAP for almost 12 years Tableau – Rate 6/10 overall but 9/10 for visualization. I have used it for three years IBM Cognos - Rate 7/10 and I have used it for three years MS BI - Rate 5/10 and I have used it for two years Pentaho - Rate 5/10 and I have used it for over five years QlikView- Rate 7/10 and I have used it for two years OBIEE – Rate 7/10 and I have used it for five years

    Customer Service and Technical Support

    Customer Service: SAP BO/BI - Below average Tableau - Good IBM Cognos - Average MS BI - Average Pentaho - Average QlikView - Above average OBIEE - Average Technical Support: SAP BO/BI - Below average Tableau - Good IBM Cognos - Average MS BI - Average Pentaho - Average QlikView - Above average OBIEE - Average

    Other Advice

    There is no perfect solution or one…     Read more →
    Questions from the Community
    Seeking lightweight open source BI software
    Top Answer:It depends on the Data architecture and the complexity of your requirement Some great tools in the market are Qlik Sense, Power BI, OBIEE, Tableau, etc. I have recently started using Cognos… more »
    Read all 8 answers   →
    What do you like most about IBM Cognos?
    Top Answer:The solution's most valuable feature is its ease of use, which makes it easily compatible with other tools.
    Read all 29 answers   →
    What needs improvement with IBM Cognos?
    Top Answer:The tool does not have much documentation on the internet. It is not easy to resolve issues by finding the reason for the problem on the internet. The tool needs to have more documentation on the… more »
    Read all 31 answers   →
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    Ranking
    7th
    out of 114 in BI (Business Intelligence) Tools
    Views
    9,140
    Comparisons
    5,304
    Reviews
    13
    Average Words per Review
    449
    Rating
    8.2
    32nd
    out of 114 in BI (Business Intelligence) Tools
    Views
    354
    Comparisons
    294
    Reviews
    0
    Average Words per Review
    0
    Rating
    N/A
    Comparisons
    Also Known As
    Cognos, Cognos Analytics, IBM Cognos Analytics
    Learn More
    IBM
    NetSuite
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    Overview

    IBM Cognos Business Intelligence provides a wide range of tools to help you analyze your organization's data. IBM Cognos BI allows businesses to monitor events and metrics, create and view business reports, and analyze data to help them make effective business decisions.

    IBM Cognos applies techniques to describe, summarize, and compare data, and draw conclusions. This allows users to see trends and discover anomalies or variances that may not be evident by simply reading data. Data sources that contain information from different areas of a business can be stored in separate packages. Users can see only information that they have been granted access to, based on their group or role.

    IBM Cognos BI consolidates the following business intelligence functions into a single web-based solution:

    • IBM Cognos Insight: Create personal and managed workspaces for data analysis. Using these interactive workspaces, you can share insight results with managers. Cognos Insight supports write-back, and you can also use these workspaces to capture and integrate management goals, commitments, and forecasts.

    • IBM Cognos Workspace: With IBM Cognos Workspace, you can create rich, interactive workspaces using IBM Cognos content as well as data from external sources. You can view and open your favorite workspaces and reports, edit content in your workspaces, and share your workspaces via email.

    • IBM Cognos Analytics: IBM Cognos Analytics utilizes built-in AI and intuitive searches which helps users to quickly create the visualizations and a wide range of reports. Cognos Analytics provides cognitive and managed self-service, enabling you to gain insights from controlled and trusted data.

    • IBM Cognos Report Studio and IBM Cognos Query Studio: Easily create structured and query reports. IBM Cognos allows users to create application and report templates. In addition, report authors can reuse report objects to apply filters, fields, and styles to reports. Users can set the language of the user interface and report content according to the user's native language.

    • IBM Cognos Event Studio: Receive notifications of events that occur within your organization in real time. Event Studio enables the creation of agents that detect the occurrence of business events, failures, or anomalies, based on the change of specific events or data conditions. Notification can be sent via email, publication in the portal, or by triggering reports.

    • IBM Cognos Connection: This is the Web portal for IBM Cognos BI and is the central area for accessing all the IBM Cognos functions. In the web portal, users can schedule and distribute reports, create tasks, administer the server and the access permissions, and more.

    Reviews from Real Users

    IBM Cognos stands out among its competitors for a number of reasons. Two major ones are its powerful analysis tool and its reporting capabilities.

    Prasad B., a senior software engineer at a financial services firm, notes, “The product is a very good reporting tool and is very flexible. It allows for the users to get a scheduled report. We can receive automated reports as well. They are easy to schedule on a weekly or monthly basis. It is very fast. I mean in means of report output, it's very fast compared to the actual clients involved.”

    NetSuite Business Intelligence provides the power of built-in, real-time dashboards, reporting and analysis across all the integrated processes within the software suite.

    Sample Customers
    More than 23,000 leading organizations across multiple industries use Cognos. Some examples of Cognos customers include BMW Financial Services, Quinte Health Care, Troy Corporation, Michigan State University, and GKN Land System.
    THE SECOND CITY, QUICKEN INC, LAND O’LAKES, LOVESAC, HELLO PRODUCTS
    Top Industries
    REVIEWERS
    Financial Services Firm14%
    Computer Software Company11%
    Insurance Company8%
    Healthcare Company8%
    VISITORS READING REVIEWS
    Educational Organization58%
    Financial Services Firm7%
    Computer Software Company5%
    Government4%
    VISITORS READING REVIEWS
    Financial Services Firm21%
    Computer Software Company10%
    Retailer10%
    Manufacturing Company6%
    Company Size
    REVIEWERS
    Small Business23%
    Midsize Enterprise15%
    Large Enterprise61%
    VISITORS READING REVIEWS
    Small Business8%
    Midsize Enterprise62%
    Large Enterprise31%
    VISITORS READING REVIEWS
    Small Business27%
    Midsize Enterprise10%
    Large Enterprise63%
    Buyer's Guide
    BI (Business Intelligence) Tools
    May 2024
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    IBM Cognos is ranked 7th in BI (Business Intelligence) Tools with 132 reviews while NetSuite Business Intelligence is ranked 32nd in BI (Business Intelligence) Tools. IBM Cognos is rated 8.0, while NetSuite Business Intelligence is rated 10.0. The top reviewer of IBM Cognos writes "Improved the quality of our KPIs, while reducing calls to the IT department". On the other hand, the top reviewer of NetSuite Business Intelligence writes "Scripting is a great feature as is the ability to export almost anything". IBM Cognos is most compared with Microsoft Power BI, Oracle OBIEE, Tableau, SAP BusinessObjects Business Intelligence Platform and Oracle Hyperion, whereas NetSuite Business Intelligence is most compared with Oracle OBIEE, Oracle Analytics Cloud, Tableau and Microsoft Power BI.

    See our list of best BI (Business Intelligence) Tools vendors.

    We monitor all BI (Business Intelligence) Tools reviews to prevent fraudulent reviews and keep review quality high. We do not post reviews by company employees or direct competitors. We validate each review for authenticity via cross-reference with LinkedIn, and personal follow-up with the reviewer when necessary.