Try our new research platform with insights from 80,000+ expert users

IBM DataPower Gateway vs Perforce Acana comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Jun 8, 2025

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

IBM DataPower Gateway
Ranking in API Management
12th
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
6.7
Number of Reviews
29
Ranking in other categories
Enterprise Service Bus (ESB) (5th), Application Infrastructure (9th), SOA Application Gateways (1st)
Perforce Acana
Ranking in API Management
30th
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
7.0
Number of Reviews
3
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of July 2025, in the API Management category, the mindshare of IBM DataPower Gateway is 4.0%, up from 3.6% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Perforce Acana is 0.5%, down from 0.7% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
API Management
 

Featured Reviews

Mehdi El Filahi - PeerSpot reviewer
Security features meets compliance needs and offers MPGW (Multi-Protocol Gateway) that simplifies integration efforts
While I like IBM products, I'm not an evangelist. I work with Java, Microsoft ASP.NET, and various technologies. I'm not tied to any specific vendor. However, I do find IBM to be a bit greedy. It's a large, profit-driven company. The support team is mostly based in India, and they follow a very structured process and protocol. Sometimes, it feels like playing ping pong with them – lots of back and forth before the problem gets escalated. You might even have to get your sales rep involved to push things along. For me, the support it could be better. Indian support teams aren't inherently bad, but with IBM, it feels impersonal. They respond, sure. But if it's a complex technical issue, they might ask you a lot of questions that just seem designed to waste your time. Sometimes it feels like they hope you'll get frustrated and solve the problem yourself.
Saurav Krishna - PeerSpot reviewer
Authentication mechanism is easy to implement but improvement is needed in documentation
For API security purposes, we use the tool to host all our APIs. This allows us to take advantage of the security features provided by the platform. With the solution, we can implement rules such as rate limiting and restricting the number of API calls for each user. It acts as a secure gateway…

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"The product is stable...The product is scalable."
"The API Connect gateway service and the SQL injection feature is good."
"Since it is a gateway, it provides a lot of security features."
"It is a scalable solution."
"If you have an API application in your organization that you want to make safe and secure, in addition to your existing WAF or load balancer, this product comes with all those capabilities:"
"What I like most is the stability."
"It is easy to use, easy to install, and it's resilient for high availability."
"The performance is good. It's been very stable."
"Good interface, intuitive solution."
"It allowed us to publish and replace pre-essential transactions in one place, with a uniformity in terms of control and policies."
"The tool's authentication mechanism is easy to implement. We had to define a few parameters."
 

Cons

"The solution requires a lot of training manuals in order to get to know it better and to be able to use it effectively."
"They should improve the solution's clustering features."
"Additional documentation needs to be provided for complex automations."
"An area for improvement in IBM DataPower Gateway is its price point because it's a relatively expensive product. Sometimes, when the customer use case is just a very small subset of what's being offered in IBM DataPower Gateway, then the product can be expensive, making my company lose some of the opportunities because of the expensive pricing. A lower price point for IBM DataPower Gateway, even if that results in a less feature-rich version, would be appreciated. In terms of additional features that I'd like to see in the next release of IBM DataPower Gateway, nothing specific comes to mind because IBM constantly improves its standards and provides quarterly updates to the product, so it's quite fine."
"Its support services could be better."
"The components that they include in the product that are, in fact, a WTX, really need to be removed from the product because they tend to fail."
"We are always looking for more features wherein it could be easily integrated with cloud applications. We are looking for either a cloud solution or a cloud integration option."
"The DCDR process should be less complex."
"Akana API Management needs to improve its documentation."
"The product has new features that we are going to implement in the next few months, such as API management and analytic reporting."
"Lacks an integrated billing feature."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The solution is expensive in comparison to other products."
"Most customers' use case budgets are not inlined with the price of IBM DataPower Gateway. It is too expensive."
"The cost is very high and requires all five components in the API management solution."
"The tool's initial costing is expensive for small banks and financial institutions."
"The licensing cost is very expensive."
"The appliance is a bit on the expensive side for the workloads that are not too high."
"This product is a bit expensive as IBM products are costly assets. However, for enterprise customers it is a worthwhile investment."
"The solution has a return on investment but is a little expensive."
"For us, the pricing and licensing policies were for an on-premise installation with a fixed cost structure, that matched our budgeting policies."
report
Use our free recommendation engine to learn which API Management solutions are best for your needs.
861,170 professionals have used our research since 2012.
 

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
29%
Insurance Company
10%
Computer Software Company
9%
Manufacturing Company
7%
Financial Services Firm
20%
Computer Software Company
14%
Manufacturing Company
12%
Insurance Company
7%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
No data available
 

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about IBM DataPower Gateway?
The MPGW (Multi-Protocol Gateway) is great because it allows you to easily expose services using various protocols – web services, REST (JSON), and others. This flexibility simplifies things.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for IBM DataPower Gateway?
I would rate the pricing a two out of ten, with one being high price, and ten being low price. It's high-priced for smaller companies. But it is okay for enterprises. So, the price could be more fl...
What needs improvement with IBM DataPower Gateway?
The DCDR process should be less complex. AI should improve developer efficiency and effort. Whenever I am writing code, it should give recommendations automatically by incorporating AI so I can wri...
What do you like most about Akana API Management?
The tool's authentication mechanism is easy to implement. We had to define a few parameters.
What needs improvement with Akana API Management?
Akana API Management needs to improve its documentation.
 

Also Known As

WebSphere DataPower, IBM DataPower, IBM WebSphere DataPower
No data available
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

RBL Bank, Availity
British American Tobacco, Credit Suisse, Daimler, eBay, FOX, Liberty Mutual, Marriott, Mayo Clinic, Skandia, Tata communications
Find out what your peers are saying about IBM DataPower Gateway vs. Perforce Acana and other solutions. Updated: June 2025.
861,170 professionals have used our research since 2012.