BMC Helix Monitor vs IBM Tivoli NetCool Impact comparison

BMC and IBM are both solutions in the Event Monitoring category. BMC is ranked #7 with an average rating of 9.0, while IBM is ranked #9 with an average rating of 7.0. BMC holds a 9.7% mindshare in EM, compared to IBM’s 3.1% mindshare. Additionally, 100% of BMC users are willing to recommend the solution, compared to 100% of IBM users who would recommend it.

BMC Helix Monitor

Read 4 BMC Helix Monitor reviews

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197 Comparison Views

100% willing to recommend

IBM Tivoli NetCool Impact

Read 5 IBM Tivoli NetCool Impact reviews

293 Views
132 Comparison Views

100% willing to recommend

BMC Helix Monitor

IBM Tivoli NetCool Impact

Comparison Buyer's Guide

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Executive SummaryUpdated on Jan 23, 2025

IBM Tivoli NetCool Impact and BMC Helix Monitor are competing products in the enterprise monitoring space. BMC Helix Monitor appears to have the upper hand because of its comprehensive feature set despite its higher price.

Features: IBM Tivoli NetCool Impact stands out with its robust event automation, efficient service integration, and flexible rules engine. In contrast, BMC Helix Monitor shines with enhanced scalability, advanced analytics capabilities, and superior asset relationship tracking, offering deep insights for complex environments.

Room for Improvement: IBM Tivoli NetCool Impact could improve by reducing deployment complexity and offering more advanced analytics features. It can also benefit from enhanced integration with modern IT environments. BMC Helix Monitor might expand its feature set to address specific niche requirements further and improve certain areas for on-premise deployment options and flexibility.

Ease of Deployment and Customer Service: IBM Tivoli NetCool Impact provides a traditional on-premises deployment that, while comprehensive, requires extended setup time. Its customer service is noted for being responsive. BMC Helix Monitor, as a SaaS-based solution, benefits from quicker deployment and modern onboarding processes, with proactive customer support offering a seamless experience.

Pricing and ROI: IBM Tivoli NetCool Impact offers a lower initial setup cost, making it appealing for businesses focusing on specific monitoring needs. It provides a good ROI. BMC Helix Monitor, although higher in initial cost, justifies this with a faster realization of ROI through its expansive capabilities, ensuring value-driven outcomes.

To learn more, read our detailed BMC Helix Monitor vs. IBM Tivoli NetCool Impact Report (Updated: June 2025).

Buyer's Guide

BMC Helix Monitor vs. IBM Tivoli NetCool Impact

June 2025

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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

BMC Helix Monitor

Ranking in Event Monitoring

7th

Average Rating

9.0

Reviews Sentiment

7.7

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

No ranking in other categories

IBM Tivoli NetCool Impact

Ranking in Event Monitoring

9th

Average Rating

7.6

Reviews Sentiment

6.5

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

No ranking in other categories

Mindshare comparison

As of June 2025, in the Event Monitoring category, the mindshare of BMC Helix Monitor is 9.7%, down from 12.4% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of IBM Tivoli NetCool Impact is 3.1%, up from 2.9% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.

Event Monitoring

Featured Reviews

Jijil GHosh

ITSM Solution Architect at CyberMAK Information Systems W.L.L.

An agentless tool that offers great scalability and a straightforward setup phase

The most valuable feature of the solution stems from the fact that BMC Helix Monitor is an agentless tool, because of which you don't need to deploy agents on each and every system in your IT environment. If you want to install an agent on each and every system, manpower is needed, while there is no such need when one uses BMC Helix Monitor. BMC Helix Monitor provides you with details on asset relationships. If a particular printer is connected to a core network printer or a particular desktop is connected to the servers, the product scans and gives you a free structure of relationship, which doesn't need any human intervention, making it an automated process. BMC Helix Monitor gives you the entire information about your assets, because of which you can sit in one place and keep track of whether a particular asset is online or offline.

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Hennie Du Toit

Principal Specialist Architecture and Governance at a tech services company with 501-1,000 employees

Event management strengthens with automation but needs better event flooding handling

Better handling of event flooding in IBM Tivoli NetCool Impact would be beneficial. If there are massive issues with power, for example, and we get millions of events, then it struggles to deal with that. Better root cause correlation and faster processing for IBM Tivoli NetCool Impact would be helpful. If there can be more end-to-end functionality, such as observability tools built in natively, that would be great. With correlation, IBM Tivoli NetCool Impact has many functions, but we've built them custom-built. Functions such as automated logging, automated dispatching, and automated notification of engineers could be native in the tool.

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Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"The most valuable feature of the solution stems from the fact that BMC Helix Monitor is an agentless tool, because of which you don't need to deploy agents on each and every system in your IT environment."

"The product's initial setup phase is easy."

"The service operations monitoring features are valuable."

"It is evolving more and more into artificial intelligence."

"The stability has been very good for IBM Tivoli NetCool Impact, rated around eight or nine."

"This product allows us to make use of open-source products, including running Java code."

"The solution is great at being able to fetch almost any kind of file."

"The most valuable feature that comes with Netcool/Impact is the ISPF APA support. It is inherent to Netcool/Impact, so I can use the ISPF of any other product, which I can invoke and consume through Impact, and do integrations, which is great. I run the Netcool desktop application so I can integrate with other applications in the ticketing system. It's a great ability being able to invoke ISPF and integrate."

"It is easy to integrate with other models such as Oracle, other systems, external systems, and to reach events."

Cons

"The product must provide more information and dashboards."

"The initial setup of the solution is complex."

"I feel that the tool's stability has some scope for improvement."

"The solution's GUI and some patching-related information are areas with shortcomings where enhancements are needed, though I believe they are areas that fall under BMC's roadmap for the future."

"The solution is somewhat complicated. It's not exactly straightforward."

"IBM is not investing in the development of the on-premise version of this solution."

"For improvement, I'd say the dashboard and the overall GUI could use some work. Although, I don't think that there's much improvement that Netcool really needs to achieve in this area, because when we're talking GUI, Impact is able to integrate with any third-party system and it comes with ISPF APA. It's more beneficial than Netcool/OMNIbus in this respect, and it's quite easy to handle."

"Better handling of event flooding in IBM Tivoli NetCool Impact would be beneficial. If there are massive issues with power, for example, and we get millions of events, then it struggles to deal with that."

"Stability-wise, this product needs to be improved."

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The product’s price could be improved."

"The licensing is yearly, and although I'm happy with the pricing I do think it could be better."

"Licensing of IBM Tivoli NetCool Impact depends on the number of nodes on the element that you are monitoring."

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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Financial Services Firm

27%

Computer Software Company

14%

Insurance Company

Healthcare Company

Financial Services Firm

19%

Retailer

12%

Computer Software Company

12%

Real Estate/Law Firm

10%

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

No data available

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about BMC Helix Monitor?

The service operations monitoring features are valuable.

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What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for BMC Helix Monitor?

The product’s price could be improved. The company is quite flexible with pricing. Legacy products need to revise their pricing strategy without losing their position in the market. The legacy mode...

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What needs improvement with BMC Helix Monitor?

I feel that the tool's stability has some scope for improvement.

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What needs improvement with IBM Tivoli NetCool Impact?

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What is your primary use case for IBM Tivoli NetCool Impact?

IBM Tivoli NetCool Impact is our event management tool, specifically the umbrella fault management tool set. All of our events across the network correlate the data for us, and we have certain use ...

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What advice do you have for others considering IBM Tivoli NetCool Impact?

We remain a partner with IBM Tivoli and continue using their products. We use IBM Tivoli NetCool Impact's AIOps functionality. We experienced some skills issues, but currently receive assistance fr...

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IBM Tivoli NetCool OMNIbus vs IBM Tivoli NetCool Impact

Compared 100% of the time

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Product Reports

Buyer's Guide

Event Monitoring

June 2025

Download BMC Helix Monitor product report

Buyer's Guide

IBM Tivoli NetCool Impact

June 2025

Download IBM Tivoli NetCool Impact product report

Also Known As

Helix Monitor

Tivoli NetCool Impact

Overview

BMC Helix Monitor is a SaaS solution that combines broad monitoring and event management capabilities with a containerized microservices architecture. Improve performance across complex environments while supporting the agility and speed required by digital businesses.

BMC

IBM Tivoli Netcool Impact is an enterprise and network management software that automates the support of business-critical functions. The software helps to enrich events with business context, provides an integrated view of data from multiple sources in context and enables custom automations.

IBM

Sample Customers

Grupo Moura, Goodman, Aspect, Telefónica Colombia, Fujitsu

Claranet, Consolidated Communications, Telus, €sterreichische Bundesbahnen (€BB), Telekom Srbija, Bendigo Community Telco, Capgemini, Schweizerische Bundesbahnen (SBB)

Buyer's Guide

BMC Helix Monitor vs. IBM Tivoli NetCool Impact

June 2025

Free Report: BMC Helix Monitor vs. IBM Tivoli NetCool Impact

Find out what your peers are saying about BMC Helix Monitor vs. IBM Tivoli NetCool Impact and other solutions. Updated: June 2025.

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