DSXchange

Hi Group,

I am doing a comparative study of informatica (PowerCenter 6.2.2 ) and Datastage (IBM Websphere DataStage Server Edition 7) to decide on which Tool to use for next project (Simple ETL for loading data in BO universe).

Can some body help me in

A)Pls Point me to some good sites for informatica
B) How much a single user license ( 1 Server & 1 Client ) will cost ?

Thanks in Advance
Gaurav

Gauravb,

pricing for both DS and Infa is much worse than anything you will ever see at a used car dealership. The published list prices bear no resemblance to the actual price a client will pay. The are many factors that influence the price which you haven't stated, so no real response is going to be possible.

In a case like this, you need to contact the sales reps of both companies. They will not be shy about telling you why their product is better than the competition's, particularly for your {fill_in_the_blank} type of implementation. Of course this information shouldn't always be taken at face value, but it does give you a good starting point.

For the most part, the members here consider DS to be the superior and less expensive option. It's TCO is lower, it outperforms, has better service, scales efficiently, and usually smells better and has prettier documentation than anything else out there. Plus the quality of the Logo'd pens and T-Shirts is above industry norms.

{Note that salespeople's comments aren't the only ones that need to be taken with a grain of salt }

Lately I would also consider "Doing It Yourself"... for DataStage/Informatica you don't pay once... you pay the initial fee, yearly maintenance fee and you're stuck with upgrading in the timeframe the tool-company dictates (unless you want end up using unsupported software) and you're very much dependent on them. Also don't underestimate the price of effort you put in upgrading the tool every x years.

In most environments I've seen and heard off the price of the tools and environment are largely underestimated. And one of the first things usually to be chopped is "expensive" training, which even makes the problem worse.

I've seen all kind of implementations... DataStage, Informatica, scripting, PL-SQL, and if your requirements are small, easy and you have some programming skills already on board I'm pretty certain doing it yourself is more cost-effective in the long run (for small things)... on the other hand if you're planning on creating a huge number of complex jobs having DataStage/Informatica may a better choice.

On the difference of Datastage and Informatica... whatever you can do with one you can do with the other (although DataStage seems to be better with SAP). Both have other plus and minus-points. DataStage seems to have a smaller learning-curve for developers. Informatica looks more architected than DataStage (e.g. for user authorization), but that's a personal feeling.

Qua pricing... Informatica is more expensive than DataStage for the same platform. Prices vary a lot, but expect at least 75.000 USD initial fee to run e.g. DataStage on a decent UNIX platform. Current pricing for DataStage depends on the number of CPU's. Last time I checked Informatica is about double the price of DataStage.

Ogmios

You pay by the server licenses, cpu count, the number of client users, the initial training, startup consulting, maintenance fees, bundle discounts, etc. There's no price schedule, it's all negotiated. You should read DMReview, as in the past they have done comparisons.

If you just want to test DataStage/Informatica, Ascential/IBM offers time limited trial licenses via their sales people (charged per month), not sure about Informatica.

At a price both are willing to come on site and help you on your specific project as consulting services.

If price is a criterion, you might also consider DTS from Microsoft. It's free (with SQL Server OLAP), and worth every penny. Connectivity is basically anything you can accomplish in the Microsoft world (ODBC, OLEDB, ...) and you have to manage all decision making by coding in VB script but, as I noted, the price is good. { Add grain of salt here. }

ray.wurlod wrote:It's free, and worth every penny.

Damning with faint praise?

Yep.

For small tasks, it's worth considering. But not really for serious ETL imho.

Gaurav,

Have you looked at the Business Objects data integrator? Since this is for a company that is already using Business Objects it may be a better choice over bringing in completely foreign technology (DataStage or Informatica). If you look in the last Gartner magic quadrant it is up there enough that I would look into it.

Here is the quote on BO from the Gartner report on ETL.

Business Objects has made solid strides in execution during the past 12 months, dramatically increasing its frequency of appearance in Gartner client inquiries and competitive situations. It has delivered good ETL license revenue growth and continues to expand the functionality of Data Integrator. The vendor's vision and positioning of the product will likely remain BI-focused, limiting its ability to win broader data integration business.

Thanks to Oracle here is the link to the magic quadrant. http://www.oracle.com/database/features_db_etlmq.html

gauravb wrote:Hi Group,

I am doing a comparative study of informatica (PowerCenter 6.2.2 ) and Datastage (IBM Websphere DataStage Server Edition 7) to decide on which Tool to use for next project (Simple ETL for loading data in BO universe).

Can some body help me in

A)Pls Point me to some good sites for informatica
B) How much a single user license ( 1 Server & 1 Client ) will cost ?

Thanks in Advance
Gaurav

Not to pick at your points, but BO Universe is NOT a database. It's a logical metadata layer that BO uses to operator against databases. Often, the universe itself is poorly designed, rendering the best underlying star schema pointless because the universe mangles everything.

My point is that the ETL has nothing to do with BO, and you haven't stated the database. I'll tell you, from my experience, DS Server and PX are extremely well supported on Oracle and UDB. Server and Oracle are nicely matured at this point, and PX and UDB are optimally pared as well.

So the questions really are:

1. Are my data integrators nuts and bolts (DataStage) people, or are they more process and business data people (PowerCenter)?
2. Are my data integrators down and dirty with the technologies, mucking around with shell scripts, tuning bulk loader control files (DataStage) people, or do they prefer a slick interface and process scheduler?
3. For a given price, say $100K US, what can you get from each ETL company?