Informatica PowerCenter Other Advice

YT
Developer, Architect at L'Oreal

I'm an expert on Informatica and some cloud integration tools, such as AWS and Azure.

I have experience with Informatica PowerCenter, Informatica PowerExchange, and also some data quality and master data management tools.

I'm currently using version 10.4 of Informatica PowerCenter.

The solution is deployed on-premises, but I also have experience with its cloud version.

Informatica PowerCenter requires maintenance because you have to take care of the environment, clean the logs, and check some CPU metrics, for example, the memory. The solution also requires some maintenance, for example, you need to restart it when the service is down, so maintaining it uses up your time.

You can have a team dedicated to Informatica PowerCenter maintenance, but that depends on the client. Some clients have dedicated teams for it, while some ask that you take care of the maintenance of the solution.

My team has ten people working on Informatica PowerCenter, but I do know that other teams work on the solution as well, particularly in integration, but I don't have information on how many Informatica PowerCenter users those teams have.

My advice to anyone looking into implementing the solution is to work on it or develop step by step. You also need a good concept to develop complex flows and mapping. You need to develop and test simultaneously to safely deliver good mapping and good products for your clients. You have to test. You have to invest in testing.

I'd rate Informatica PowerCenter seven out of ten.

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Lars Borchers - PeerSpot reviewer
Senior BI Backend Developer at ALD Automotive Portugal

If a newcomer works with the solution, it's a difficult solution to use. There are so many details that we have to find to understand what's possible to do with it. We would need help from our seniors. Otherwise, it's very hard to find all those features. Overall, I rate the solution an eight out of ten.

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AS
Associate Manager at Accenture

Currently, we moved to IICS.

Two engineers are needed for the maintenance of the solution.

I would recommend the solution to those planning to use it.

Nowadays, better products are coming into the market. If you ask something from five years ago, I would say it was fine back then. Better products are available at a cheaper cost, so the competition is high for Informatica.

Overall, I rate the product a seven out of ten.

View full review »
Buyer's Guide
Informatica PowerCenter
March 2024
Learn what your peers think about Informatica PowerCenter. Get advice and tips from experienced pros sharing their opinions. Updated: March 2024.
765,234 professionals have used our research since 2012.
MS
Assistant Manager at a insurance company with 10,001+ employees

I advise others to consider the licensing part of the solution before making the purchase decision. If they have no cost-related issues, then it is the best tool. I rate it as a nine.

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Katarzyna Palikowska - PeerSpot reviewer
ETL Developer at Det Norske Veritas

I'm an end-user. 

The product is a very popular ETL tool. 

There are good courses available to help people learn the product, and it is a valuable tool to get to know. 

I'd rate the solution eight out of ten overall. It is easy to use and stable and offers good support. However, I'm not sure if it is ideal for smaller companies. Some of the hardware requirements may be difficult to fulfill. 

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PB
Technical Manager at Agriitex

I'm not a partner or reseller.

I've worked with various versions, from 8.6 to 10.1.

PowerCenter is going to be decommissioned by 2025. Already, people have started migrating from PowerCenter to Informatica Cloud. 

It may be better not to implement that right away. It is better to go straight away with Informatica Cloud or any other tool like SnapLogic. Even Informatica Cloud has some issues in terms of migrating PowerCenter to Informatica Cloud. At this point, however, every solution gives similar output. Regarding cost, you can go with some other tools like SnapLogic that may be less expensive.

I'd rate the solution eight out of ten.

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HK
Developer and Team Lead at ZIM

I recommend the tool to those who plan to use it, but there might be certain disadvantages attached with the product in the areas of pricing and its integration capabilities with APIs.

I rate the overall tool an eight out of ten.

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VS
Senior Associate at PwC Acceleration Centers

This solution has provided me with all functions that I need. I recommend others to use Informatica PowerCenter if they have a decent knowledge of how data migration and data integration works. If they have good knowledge about it and if they have used any other ETL tools previously, they will find it easier to use Informatica PowerCenter. 

If it is for a beginner, I would suggest they learn something about the basics of how data migration works, and then they can start using it.

I rate Informatica PowerCenter a nine out of ten.

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Ramesh SV - PeerSpot reviewer
Senior Technical Lead / Practise Architecht at TEKsystems (ex Aston Carter)

My advice to others is for them to get used to using the tool and make sure near real-time integrations are less. If they want to keep the configurations and use batch mode data they can do so.

I rate Informatica PowerCenter an eight out of ten.

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DC
Director at Lolatech

This is my first experience with this kind of tool, I would rate Informatica PowerCenter a nine out of ten.

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Muhammad -Usman - PeerSpot reviewer
Data AI Architect at a comms service provider with 10,001+ employees

I rate the overall product a seven out of ten.

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RR
Practice Head - Advanced Analytics & Cloud at a computer software company with 201-500 employees

It's obviously the best.

I would rate Informatica PowerCenter a ten out of ten.

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CC
Senior Oracle Database Administrator at a financial services firm with 1,001-5,000 employees

I'm an end-user.

The solution is very popular. I'd rate it ten out of ten. It is an excellent tool.

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GF
Computer system engineer at Groupe Casino

I would rate it an eight out of 10. It works.

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Ravi Kuppusamy - PeerSpot reviewer
CEO and Founder at BAssure Solutions

In terms of innovation, creativity is not there in this solution. It is still an on-prem ETL tool. Informatica is one of the best options today and no doubt about it. However, is it cloud-ready? I don't think so. Therefore, I'd rate the solution a five out of ten.

Beyond cloud readiness (or lack thereof), pricing is an issue. It's relatively high compared to other products on the market. We all have to move from IBM thinking. You sell the customer and then penalize them with the pricing, pricing, pricing. That is where IBM has today become a dead man walking underneath, has become two different companies now. This company should learn from IBM. Pricing cannot be the only way of making money and probably comes with innovation, creativity, making it cloud-ready, and then transferring those benefits in order to sell more licenses. 

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GB
Director at a financial services firm with 10,001+ employees

I would rate it an eight out of 10.

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SG
Solution Design Expert at a pharma/biotech company with 10,001+ employees

I am a customer and end-user.

I'm not sure if I would recommend PoerCenter. However, I would definitely recommend the cloud.

I'd rate the solution eight out of ten. Unfortunately, it doesn't scale and lacks some cloud connectivity.

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Hari Kathireshan - PeerSpot reviewer
Sr PHP Developer at GE

I would recommend that others considering the solution go ahead and use it for any batch and high volume loads with complex transactions. Informatica performs very well. I would rate it as an eight out of ten. 

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RajeevKumar9 - PeerSpot reviewer
Software Test Automation Engineer at Atradius

In summary, this is a good tool and I definitely recommend it. It integrates with distributed systems and if the use cases involve data ETL then this is the best tool to use.

I would rate this solution an eight out of ten.

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MA
CIO at a tech services company with 1,001-5,000 employees

In summary, Informatica is a good product that is very difficult to learn but once you learn it, it's very easy to use. It is a product that I can recommend using.

I would rate this solution an eight out of ten.

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it_user275235 - PeerSpot reviewer
Data Warehousing and Business Intelligence Lead at Bank of America

Informatica is a great product. If you can spend a good amount of time researching what you want,have a proper SDLC in place, and work with the technicality of Informatica, I am sure most of the projects can roll out into production in a timely fashion and produce results. In my experience, not having proper road-map in place, and not auditing change requests, business analysts will struggle with their requirements. This causes more bottlenecks and rework than an actual development. Having said that, no project is a walk in the park, but Informatica can be the icing on the cake if the foundation is good.

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AE
Enterprise application architect at Ministry of Health

We're end-users.

We are not using the latest version of the solution. We are using one of the previous versions. It's around version 10. I don't know the EMEA number.

I'd rate the solution nine out of ten. 

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SB
Project Manager at a tech services company with 10,001+ employees

My advice is that if you are looking for a traditional on-premises service, PowerCenter is a good option to stick with. If on the other hand, you want a cloud-based service then there are better options.

In summary, this is a good product, and other than integrating with other tools, I don't face any challenges.

I would rate this solution a seven out of ten.

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Mohammad Faizan Ahmad - PeerSpot reviewer
Sr. Technical Associate at Investcorp Bank BSC

I rate Informatica PowerCenter seven out of 10. It's a good product that many organizations in banking continue to use because it isn't easy to migrate to something else. 

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Sunil_Shah - PeerSpot reviewer
Senior software developer at a tech services company with 1,001-5,000 employees

I rate this solution an eight out of ten. Regarding advice, it is important that ETL functionalities are readily available and that it is GUI friendly.

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AT
Technology Director at a computer software company with 1,001-5,000 employees

It is a very mature product, but now everyone is moving to the cloud. They need to give more attention and focus more on the IICS rather than PowerCenter. PowerCenter on-premises will cater to one or two industries, and they should give more features in IICS. It can cater to only 70% of the features of Informatica PowerCenter. The data integration is currently not as mature in IICS. It doesn't have Mapplets, and we have faced some constraints. We have already logged a service request for this.

I would rate Informatica PowerCenter a nine out of ten.

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VJ
Principal Consultant at Genpact - Headstrong

On a scale from one to ten, I would give Informatica PowerCenter a nine.

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Mohamed Elkady - PeerSpot reviewer
Sr.Manager - Data Management & Data Governance at a tech company with 201-500 employees

Informatica PowerCenter is an on-premise data integration solution, but two or three years ago, Informatica introduced a new, intelligent data platform. That new platform is the equivalent of Informatica PowerCenter in terms of capability, but the only difference is that it's a fully on-cloud solution.

Informatica PowerCenter is best for big enterprises. Technically, you can use it for any scale, but practically you will get the most output when you're dealing with high volumes and heavy processing. This is from a technical aspect. Price-wise, it's not a cheap platform, so only enterprises with a bigger data management budget will be able to afford to invest in a data management platform such as Informatica PowerCenter.

My rating for Informatica PowerCenter is eight out of ten. Eight is a fair rating because it's a very stable and very mature product.

My company has a partnership with Informatica and other vendors. I'm a system integrator.

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Parwaz Khan - PeerSpot reviewer
Head of Data Analytics at Bupa Arabia

This is an amazing solution. If I ranked it in terms of all of the data integration solutions, I would rank it first.

I rate Informatica PowerCenter a seven out of ten.

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CR
Business Intelligence Architect at a manufacturing company with 10,001+ employees

Informatica is so rigid and so we were trying to look for other partners for our entire ETL process. Modern data solutions are more cost effective and mature with the latest data basis or cloud awareness. We are going to decrease our usage of Informatica.

If you already have Informatica and plan to move to the cloud solution, then you have to evaluate other solutions based on compatibility and do a thorough cost analysis. They have been the market leaders for more than 15 to 20 years. They could use their experience to make better products for modern cloud adoption. 

I would rate this solution a five out of ten.

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PS
Analytics Insights - Manager at a consultancy with 10,001+ employees

I'm an end-user.

I'd advise new users to go through proper training and get at least one to two years of proper work experience in it before they actually go to customers to suggest its implementation - especially if they will be the primary point of contact.

I would rate the solution nine out of ten.

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Raghavendra Rao - PeerSpot reviewer
Solution Architect at Refinitiv

I would not recommend anyone use this solution.

I rate Informatica PowerCenter a one out of ten.

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FN
Principal Associate at Data Meaning, Inc.

It's Informatica PowerCenter I work with a lot of times, but I also have knowledge on Informatica Data Quality. Now on my last project, I'll be working with MDM, but I'm not an expert on MDM, as I've mostly been working with PowerCenter.

I've been working with this solution since 2010 on a lot of projects which I don't have on top of my head right now. I live in Brazil and I've been working for the government for healthcare where I used this solution. I also worked with PowerCenter for an insurance company. I used this solution during integration where we also created a web API. This is a feature in Informatica that can deploy and make APIs available for third parties or vendors so they can do acquisitions, restore API, and get data. These are what we created in PowerCenter as well.

All the projects were deployed on-premise. I never work on the cloud, but I would love to. Deployment took six months for this project.

We have 30 to 50 people using this solution. If the project goes well, if there are more resources to implement this solution, and more features to improve the analytics of the company, then we will plan to increase usage of this solution.

I'm a PowerCenter guy, so I'm rating this solution a ten.

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RS
Senior ETL Developer at Office of State Revenue

I rate this solution an eight out of ten and I will recommend others to use it, even though it is a little expensive, compared to other solutions.

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Henry Niessen - PeerSpot reviewer
Founder at DEN21DS

I'm a developer and architect. I'm not reselling the product.

I'd rate the product eight out of ten.

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RK
Team Lead Manager at a manufacturing company with 10,001+ employees

I am satisfied with the solution. 

I rate Informatica PowerCenter as a nine out of ten. 

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VN
Technical Lead at a financial services firm with 5,001-10,000 employees

I would recommend this solution to others.

I rate Informatica PowerCenter a nine out of ten.

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HA
Senior Data Architect at a manufacturing company with 10,001+ employees

When compared with other ETL or ELP tools, Informatica PowerCenter is the best for connecting to multiple sources, which is better when you have large loads. 

I would definitely rate Informatica PowerCenter a nine out of ten.

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RM
Head of Business Integration and Architecture at Jakala

My advice for this product is to be aware of what's involved and be sure about deploying and using it because it's a very technical tool, something you cannot buy and install in some weird brutal machine. It requires planning and has to be managed, not only in terms of using it, but also economically speaking, because of the cost.

I would rate this solution a nine out of 10. 

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RP
Solutions & Achitecture Data Analyst Specialist at a construction company with 10,001+ employees

There is a lot of competition in the space, and the vendors want to get good companies where they can implement their solution. It doesn't mean that every product fits every organization. My advice for anybody researching this type of solution is to meet with all of the vendors, discuss the proof of concept based on what the company has, and see if the solution is really the proper one for them. The vendors need to be honest in evaluating whether the product can really fit the needs, and they should be able to justify it.

Overall, we are satisfied with the product so far, as well as the support. In any tool, there's always something to chase and always something that can be done better.

I would rate this solution a seven out of ten.

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it_user488589 - PeerSpot reviewer
Technology Architect at Broadridge Financial Solutions

It is a good, scalable solution, provided the infrastructure is taken care of.

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IB
Service Delivery Manager & Data Governance Consultant at Master Works

PowerCenter is good for large enterprises and good for ETL purposes, but not for ELT. If you need to go with ELT, Informatica has another package called Data Streaming that's more stable and recommended for a larger environment. 

I would rate Informatica an eight out of ten. 

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Muharrem Iseri - PeerSpot reviewer
Managing Partner at a tech services company with 11-50 employees

I rate PowerCenter a nine out of ten. To those looking into implementing PowerCenter, I would advise evaluating whether they have a large company. If their first criteria is not pricing, I totally recommend Informatica as their first ETL tool, but if there are pricing, performance and support, etc. requirements, maybe they can evaluate ODI and Informatica together. If you have an Oracle ecosystem, I think you can get Oracle or ODI cheaper than Informatica, but if you don't, I think Informatica could be a leading option. It depends on what the customer has. 

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VS
Lead Application Developer and Informatica Administrator at a healthcare company with 501-1,000 employees

If you are a small company it depends on how much data integration you need. I cannot blindly say you should always go with Informatica because it depends what your needs are and whether you can afford Informatica or not.

I would give Informatica a 10-plus out of 10 because it satisfies all our requirements, it is robust and scalable.

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ChandrasekharPetaka - PeerSpot reviewer
VP - Digital at a tech vendor with 1,001-5,000 employees

I rate Informatica PowerCenter a six out of ten. 

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NM
Principal Consultant at a tech services company with 501-1,000 employees

We are using these solutions: Oracle Data Integrator with different versions, Informatica PowerCenter, Informatica Cloud Data Integration, and Talend. Matillion, we explored, but we don't use it for our company. We are a consulting partner. We are an implementation partner, so our consultants use these to implement solutions to many of our customers. We are an indirect partner through Oracle, and not a direct partner of Informatica.

Informatica PowerCenter is deployed both ways: on-premises and on cloud, but on cloud very recently. In the past two years, we have been using the cloud version. Deployment for this solution could take one to two days, if the person doing it is knowledgeable.

We have a team of 70 members who are data engineers and data analysts, but for the actual installation, setup, and configuration, we have another team made up of system/application administrators. We have a shared service model with 50+ associates who take care of this service. They will take a day or two to complete the deployment. Given all the infrastructure details available from the customer, it wouldn't take more than a day or two, worst case two days on average to set up and start the system, for it to be ready for working on and developing the ETL.

To maintain this solution, in a shared service model, e.g. not dedicated, it requires two to three people, but if it is dedicated, then one person can handle the maintenance.

There are two ways we are using this ETL solution. Number one: as part of Oracle's prepackaged solution, and number two: as an independent solution.

I don't deal with the licensing, but as part of Oracle's pre-packaged analytics solutions, we did use them. There's a one-time fee plus yearly support. That is their model, but I don't know the costs associated.

My advice to new customers of this solution is that if they are looking for an enterprise scale data warehouse and data management solution, Informatica PowerCenter is one of the go-to proven tools. Its limitations are on these two areas: one is that it needs to enable the cloud-based version to do batch processing, e.g. heavy data loads, and two is that it needs to enable connectivity to the NoSQL compliant and unstructured data sources.

Keeping the two product limitations out, e.g. the cloud version has limitations for batch processing and is unable to process unstructured and semi-structured data, my rating for Informatica PowerCenter is an eight out of ten.

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Dusanka Mladenovic - PeerSpot reviewer
Data Architect at a financial services firm with 5,001-10,000 employees

PowerCenter requires some discipline in terms of the implementation process, and because it is dealing with databases, there are several layers of protection and authorization. 

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MohamedFouda - PeerSpot reviewer
Informatica Developer at a computer software company with 51-200 employees

I rate Informatica PowerCenter eight out of 10. It provides everything I need. Nothing is missing. PowerCenter is a good tool for on-premise databases. If you're going to implement PowerCenter, you need to think about your requirements to determine what tools to use.

For example, I need the repository to auto-refresh. When I make changes to a project, workflow, mapping, or session, I want everything to refresh automatically. Otherwise, you must disconnect from the repository and reconnect for the changes you made to be reflected in your project.

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DS
Resource Manager at a computer software company with 1,001-5,000 employees

We have a team of around 40 to 50 people who use the solution.

I would, for sure, recommend the solution to others, since I feel it to be a really strong tool. It is very robust and has complex capabilities. It allows one to accomplish tasks with ease. We are talking about a strong ETL for those who are undertaking ETL related tasks.

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MG
Lead BI&A Consultant at a computer software company with 10,001+ employees

I would recommend this solution to others. It is also a question of the purpose and how big the company is. It's an investment.

I would rate Informatica PowerCenter a nine out of ten.

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DL
Data Architecture/Management at a consultancy with 10,001+ employees

Oracle put Informatica into their product line. They use Informatica fo do the integrations.

The one benefit is that you reduce your administrative overhead by implementing this tool, and you get more functionality out of it versus most other tools. 

With a lot of other tools, you have to do a lot of hacking in order to get things to work properly for you, whereas with Informatica, you have a lot of flexibility.

I would rate this solution an eight out of ten.

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KG
Associate Manager at a consultancy with 501-1,000 employees

I would recommend this solution to others. I would rate Informatica PowerCenter an eight out of ten.

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KS
Senior Consultant at a computer software company with 1,001-5,000 employees

I would recommend this solution to others depending on whether they are on-prem based or cloud-based. If most of their data is on-prem, I would recommend this solution. If they are not on-prem, I would recommend looking for another tool that is more suitable.

I would rate Informatica PowerCenter an eight out of ten.

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it_user1119516 - PeerSpot reviewer
Project Manager at a comms service provider with 1,001-5,000 employees

We run the solution on our servers, not the cloud.

I would rate this solution seven out of ten.

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it_user202221 - PeerSpot reviewer
Business Intelligence Analyst at a comms service provider with 10,001+ employees

Be persistent in trying to implement all kinds of transformations with Power Center, you will be happy with the final result.

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AR
Senior Technical Lead at Speridian Technologies

There are several products, but we recommend using this solution.

I would rate Informatica PowerCenter an eight out of ten.

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SS
Senior Software Engineer at Depository Trust & Clearing Corporation

I would recommend PowerCenter depending on the use case. 

I would rate it a seven out of ten. 

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it_user1030422 - PeerSpot reviewer
Director of Innovation & Development Department at a tech services company with 51-200 employees

We have some projects on call. I work for a professional services company, so we have different clients that have different types of infrastructure. For us in our region, most of the clients have an on-premise infrastructure. Usually, we have on-premise deployments.

I would recommend this solution to others.

I would rate this solution nine out of ten. It's almost perfect.

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RemonHanna - PeerSpot reviewer
Data Engineer at a tech services company with 51-200 employees

I rate Informatica PowerCenter an eight out of ten.

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SK
Senior Architect at a computer software company with 10,001+ employees

I would recommend it to potential users.

On a scale from one to ten, I would give Informatica PowerCenter an eight.

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MK
Data Scientist at IME

Our company has many locations, in the Middle East and Africa, but we're mostly based in Cairo, and have about 100 engineers using the solution.

In terms of advice, I would give to others considering using the solution, I'd say this: they should start with a datasheet of every product on Informatica. Licensing is expensive, so you should study the needs of the customer or your business and make a compliance matrix between the products and what the company needs. You'll run into big problems if your customer's needs aren't met in the Informatica products you choose.

I would rate the solution at a seven or eight out of ten. They're still far away from offering a holistic solution for better management, and there can be more enhancements in use cases, but it's a good solution.

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it_user785520 - PeerSpot reviewer
Regional Manager at a tech services company with 201-500 employees

We use the on-premises version of the solution.

I'm a consultant, and I largely work with enterprises.

I would recommend the product for integration. It's one of the best tools in the integration field.

I would rate this solution nine out of ten.

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it_user793938 - PeerSpot reviewer
Integration developer at a tech services company with 10,001+ employees

Good product if you are trying implement data quality, data integration, and data management projects.

We have a good relationship with the vendor. We get notifications related to new products for user validation and beta release. We have given user experience feedback for Operational Insights tool.

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it_user677700 - PeerSpot reviewer
DW Admin at a hospitality company with 1,001-5,000 employees

Choose the right tool for the right job.

For the purpose that this product was designed, I believe it is still the best in the market.

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DD
Associate Director at a consultancy with 1,001-5,000 employees

I would rate this solution an eight out of 10. 

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it_user4518 - PeerSpot reviewer
Head of Databases at a retailer with 501-1,000 employees
Our organization is using it because it is one of the leading data integration tools available in the market and supports large data volumes and meets our demands for security and performance. PowerCenter is serving as the data integration foundation for our enterprise integration initiatives including data warehousing, data governance, data migration, SOA), and MDM. Powercenter in my opinion has the best data transfer technologies including its standard, advanced, big data, real time, data virtualization and cloud editions. View full review »
AE
Data Engineer at a tech services company with 51-200 employees

I'm working with a lot of Informatica products. I use Informatica PowerCenter and IDQ as well as Informatica Axon.

In terms of Informatica Powercenter, we're not using the cloud. We have it running on our own servers.

Overall, I find that it's a very helpful product and a powerful tool compared to other products.

I would rate this solution eight out of ten.

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TV
Information Technology Security Analyst at a tech services company with 10,001+ employees

I would definitely recommend this to my friends as well as anyone who is interested in using this solution.

I would rate Informatica PowerCenter a ten out of ten.

View full review »
Buyer's Guide
Informatica PowerCenter
March 2024
Learn what your peers think about Informatica PowerCenter. Get advice and tips from experienced pros sharing their opinions. Updated: March 2024.
765,234 professionals have used our research since 2012.