We performed a comparison between Informatica PowerCenter and SAP Data Services based on our users’ reviews in four categories. After reading all of the collected data, you can find our conclusion below.
Comparison Results: SAP Data Services wins out in this comparison. The main difference between the two solutions is that Informatica PowerCenter cannot do batch processing and users also consider it to be expensive.
"One of the most valuable features for us is the metadata repository because it can easily understand the lineage of first target mapping. My company and I also find Informatica really easy to use—when a consultant joins our company, in just a few days to a few weeks, they can understand how to use it—so we prefer to use this ETL tool."
"Easy, scalable, robust platform to integrate heterogeneous source platform's data into the unified data warehouse."
"Technical support, and their approach is good. They have a support portal and support tickets. If you open a ticket it has multiple levels of severity from level one to very high or critical."
"The ability to scale through partitions helped us to improve the performance."
"Enterprise-scale ETL solution that's very stable and is easy to scale. It integrates and connects with multiple new systems, both structured and semi-structured."
"Complex transformations can be easily achieved by using PowerCenter. The processing layer does transformations and other things. About 80% of my transformations can be achieved by using the middle layer. For the remaining 15% to 20% transformations, I can go in and create stored procedures in the respective databases. Mapplets is the feature through which we can reuse transformations across pipelines. Transformations and caching are the key features that we have been using frequently. Informatica PowerCenter is one of the best solutions or products in the data integration space. We have extensively used PowerCenter for integration purposes. We usually look at the best bridge solution in our architecture so that it can sustain for maybe a couple of years. Usually, we go with the solution that fits best and has proven and time-tested technology."
"Informatica PowerCenter has been implementing mapping design, data flow, and workflow execution for years."
"In the end, you have structured, proper data for use in an integrated BI solution."
"Technical support from SAP is awesome. If we have an issue, they give a good solution."
"The solution is easy to use since it's a graphical tool. It also requires only low-level coding."
"The logic is also simple. It makes it easy to build your extraction."
"Its integration capabilities and the data migration capabilities are the most valuable. It is very good for SAP and non-SAP tools. It has very good integration with SAP, but it also has the capabilities to connect to other systems. We find it very helpful and stable."
"The HANA database, which is very fast, is a valuable feature."
"The reporting on the data, even from third-party software, is very good."
"I appreciate having access to the SAP data."
"The maintenance of data services is the solution's most valuable feature."
"We had stability issues, mostly with JVM size."
"PowerCenter could integrate better with cloud applications. We had to do a lot of configuration work using API integrations to connect with cloud applications. Informatica Cloud Data Integration has a generic connector that you can use directly, so it's much easier."
"Support could be better."
"Its interface can be modernized. It is an old product. I have been working with it for 14 years, and it still looks the same. It hasn't been modernized much. It also needs to handle more modern formats, such as JSON files. It works with the old text files and databases, but it does not always work with the newer, modern stuff. You need to make your own programs to support that kind of stuff. Support is also a kind of difficult with Informatica. They don't do direct support and rely on using their distributors around the globe for support, which means that you kind of have to go through this layer of different companies before you get help."
"The initial setup is not straightforward. You need expertise to do it."
"Lacks ability to calculate cost of the product."
"In the future, I would like to see Informatica PowerCenter integrate a more powerful dashboard."
"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."
"There needs to be multi-language support, however, my understanding is they are working on multi-language now."
"The interface is not quite user-friendly and is in need of improvement."
"The skillset of data engineers matters a bit to use all the functionality of this solution. Otherwise, the delivery speed won't be faster."
"It would be nice if this solution was a bit easier to move from development to production."
"It will work fine only in an SAP environment. It could be said that the integration with other vendors could be better."
"The execution engines and processing engines have shortcomings and need improvements."
"Data Services SAP is lacking in sources and target databases compared to Informatica. SAP Data Services should have more connectivity."
"We encounter challenges while exporting implemented rules, such as those applied to objects like the material master, into a format like Excel for documentation and further analysis."
Informatica PowerCenter is ranked 3rd in Data Integration with 78 reviews while SAP Data Services is ranked 10th in Data Integration with 45 reviews. Informatica PowerCenter is rated 8.0, while SAP Data Services is rated 8.0. The top reviewer of Informatica PowerCenter writes "Stable, provides good support, and integrating it with other systems is very fast, but its pricing is expensive". On the other hand, the top reviewer of SAP Data Services writes "Responsive support, scalable, and beneficial integration". Informatica PowerCenter is most compared with Informatica Cloud Data Integration, Azure Data Factory, SSIS, Databricks and Alteryx Designer, whereas SAP Data Services is most compared with Azure Data Factory, Syniti Data Quality, SAP Process Orchestration, Palantir Foundry and SSIS. See our Informatica PowerCenter vs. SAP Data Services report.
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