We performed a comparison between Anaplan and IBM Cognos based on real PeerSpot user reviews.
Find out what your peers are saying about Anaplan, Oracle, Jedox and others in Business Performance Management."I am impressed with the tool’s real-time calculations and intuitive interface. The tool’s user interface is the best compared to other software that I have worked with. I also find the tool’s management reporting feature valuable."
"The solution works very well for budgeting."
"It's real-time connected planning, so the calculations are pretty much seamless as far as your model is connected."
"The best thing is that it's very intuitive and user-friendly. You don't need coding skills to manipulate the platform."
"I believe Anaplan is a new cloud tool, and from time to time, there's a lot of improvement that the Anaplan company deploys with the system. So, with that improvement, we need to really adapt and know the new system trends."
"Anaplan's in-memory calculation engine is super-fast compared to the old tools we previously used. You enter the data and everything shows up in one go."
"Anaplan is a three-dimensional cloud platform that is good for analyzing data, visualization, integration, terrific for visibility."
"You don't need to have a programming language to use Anaplan."
"Cognos' most valuable features are the bundled studios, simple UI, and advanced features like the ability to create data modules."
"If they want dashboarding, storytelling, and analyzing why KPIs are met or not, then Cognos is a better candidate than Qlik Sense."
"The dashboarding offered by this solution is very valuable to us."
"The Report Studio that is aimed at professional report writers."
"IBM Cognos offers tools so that you can design and develop your own test queries and reporting solutions."
"A positive feature is Report Studio, where we create beautiful, complex reports."
"Stability-wise, I rate the solution a ten out of ten."
"We are able to generate quality reports easily which allows us to decrease response time."
"Anaplan's workflow component is probably the biggest area for improvement. I'd also like to see Anaplan add an ad hoc reporting tool that allows users to query things. It's going to factor into how you design your data set and your models, but I'd like the ability to create ad hoc queries against the data that's in there."
"The negative is that the higher the flexibility, the higher is the complexity. That can act against you as a negative because it does require a model builder or a coder/developer."
"It would be nice if the solution offered better extensions."
"The tool needs to work on its integration with MS Excel and MS Word. The tool does not allow data analysis in spreadsheets which is possible on other platforms. I want the solution to be more collaborative to facilitate decision-making in organizations."
"The visualization tools in the product are limited in comparison to other reporting tools."
"Space and integration are a problem."
"One area of improvement is conditional formatting. It's not very practical, and you need to specify additional formatting."
"When there is a lot of data, it sometimes takes long to load."
"They were lacking in the initial phases of development in the area of big data, and they still need to improve that aspect of the product."
"I would like them to reinclude PowerPlay. One thing that I am missing in the current Cognos is what was formally named PowerPlay. They have basically removed PowerPlay from it, which is something that I fail to understand because it was the most wonderful tool for business intelligence that I've ever used. As far as I know, they don't provide this functionality anymore, so this is one thing that I dislike about Cognos."
"It would be good if the solution had conditional formatting."
"One key area for improvement is the need to improve the self-service nature and functionality of the product in terms of visual analytics."
"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."
"This product could use improvement in terms of usability for those with less technical know how."
"We need more predictive analytical functions, not only diagnostic or decryptic analytics."
"The charts and graphics are weak."
Anaplan is ranked 1st in Business Performance Management with 24 reviews while IBM Cognos is ranked 7th in BI (Business Intelligence) Tools with 132 reviews. Anaplan is rated 8.0, while IBM Cognos is rated 8.0. The top reviewer of Anaplan writes "Great for large-scale modelling, easy to learn, and very stable". On the other hand, the top reviewer of IBM Cognos writes "Improved the quality of our KPIs, while reducing calls to the IT department". Anaplan is most compared with SAP ERP, SAP S/4HANA, Oracle Hyperion, SAP Analytics Cloud and IBM Planning Analytics, whereas IBM Cognos is most compared with Microsoft Power BI, Oracle OBIEE, Tableau, SAP BusinessObjects Business Intelligence Platform and Oracle Hyperion.
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