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IBM API Connect vs Informatica Intelligent Cloud Services comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Sep 17, 2024

Review summaries and opinions

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

ROI

Sentiment score
6.9
IBM API Connect enhances profitability and efficiency by reducing development time, improving security, and enabling seamless system integration.
Sentiment score
5.5
Informatica Intelligent Cloud Services enhanced data integration, improved efficiency, automation, accuracy, scalability, and productivity, leading to better decision-making.
Reducing development hours from eighty to four for an API was possible due to reusing existing scripts from DataPower.
Leadership prefers to utilize third-party tools, such as Snowflake, which has both storage and ELT features.
 

Customer Service

Sentiment score
6.4
IBM API Connect support is proactive and expert but variable in speed, with regional availability challenges noted by users.
Sentiment score
6.0
Informatica Cloud Services support is well-regarded, though some desire quicker responsiveness and deeper expertise despite overall satisfaction.
Support is excellent when it comes to APIC.
We expect more responsive assistance because they have the expertise since Informatica is their tool, but I don't see enough expertise on the Informatica support side.
My impression of their support is positive, and everything is functioning well.
 

Scalability Issues

Sentiment score
7.4
IBM API Connect offers excellent scalability through on-premise and cloud solutions, supporting enterprise-level operations and customization features.
Sentiment score
8.7
Informatica Intelligent Cloud Services is praised for impressive scalability and supportive licensing, with some concerns about financial investment.
With container versions, scaling up or down the gateways deployed into pods is a two to three-minute task for the operations team.
The scalability provided by Informatica is commendable.
There are many options available, and the licensing model is quite good, supporting our needs effectively.
 

Stability Issues

Sentiment score
7.3
IBM API Connect is generally stable and reliable, especially in government and banking, despite occasional upgrade issues.
Sentiment score
8.2
Informatica Intelligent Cloud Services is reliably stable with positive user ratings, though minor bugs affect some beginners.
The runtime engine for the APIC Gateway is still a DataPower component, which has been stable in the industry for about fifteen years.
 

Room For Improvement

IBM API Connect needs better integration, automation, monitoring, documentation, and usability, facing issues in setup, costs, and support.
Informatica Intelligent Cloud Services requires cost, integration, and usability improvements, with a focus on documentation and API enhancement.
Examples include the lack of connectivity to MQ.
We face issues with the API side, as Cloud Application Integration cannot handle large volumes; according to the API page, there is a limitation of 500 records or 500 MB.
If the development interface could be optimized to have fewer modules, it would be greatly beneficial.
Informatica Intelligent Cloud Services already integrates with AI platforms, we need to use these tools rigorously and check all these aspects, including machine learning and analytics.
 

Setup Cost

IBM API Connect offers scalable solutions with high costs, suitable for large enterprises, available in SaaS and on-premise versions.
Users find Informatica pricing moderate and competitive, though it can be expensive with added service charges and larger implementations.
Pricing depends on how many instances run across environments.
Informatica Intelligent Cloud Services is affordable for my specific use cases, with the pricing being rated three or four on a scale where one is very cheap.
Regarding pricing, compared to other tools I have worked with, Informatica offers competitive pricing, which I find not high in terms of starting strategy.
 

Valuable Features

IBM API Connect excels with strong security, integration, usability, analytics, flexibility, and scalability, enhancing API management and monetization.
Informatica Intelligent Cloud Services offers cloud-based data management with integration, security, scalability, and AI support for diverse sources.
It offers significant development efficiency, reducing man-hours from eighty to four when creating APIs.
The connectors serve as the main functionality, making data integration processes more efficient by saving time and effort.
Informatica Intelligent Cloud Services allows us to manage the entire data lifecycle in the insurance domain, supporting microservices architecture and leveraging AI and machine learning for data discovery, quality, and integration.
Developers do not need to control the actual data; they can build without even interacting with the data itself, so I don't foresee any security issues for developers in this context.
 

Categories and Ranking

IBM API Connect
Ranking in Integration Platform as a Service (iPaaS)
8th
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
6.6
Number of Reviews
76
Ranking in other categories
API Management (4th)
Informatica Intelligent Clo...
Ranking in Integration Platform as a Service (iPaaS)
11th
Average Rating
8.6
Reviews Sentiment
6.9
Number of Reviews
9
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of June 2025, in the Integration Platform as a Service (iPaaS) category, the mindshare of IBM API Connect is 2.8%, up from 1.5% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Informatica Intelligent Cloud Services is 0.7%, up from 0.4% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Integration Platform as a Service (iPaaS)
 

Featured Reviews

Shanmugasundaram Shanmuganathan - PeerSpot reviewer
Offers basic API orchestration and provides robust security and governance features
While Azure API Management offers configurable scalability, IBM API Connect relies on Kubernetes clusters. This might seem manual and require defining cluster instances upfront, but it's completely customizable and not on-the-fly scaling. It's completely custom-driven, not on-the-fly scaling, which some may consider cumbersome. Overall, I would rate the scalability an eight out of ten. Almost all applications we've been exposing lately go through this middleware, so it's used extensively. There are around sixty applications directly using it, but six Kubernetes clusters serve those applications. It's heavily used for integration, including system-to-system integration and product integrations. Our usage has been increasing year-on-year based on our needs.
Divya-Raj - PeerSpot reviewer
Handles large data volumes effectively and offers competitive pricing
There is a lot of improvement required, as we still face some cache issues most of the time, which is a challenge that we expect to see resolved in the future. Additionally, there is some limitation when we are working with a tool, especially regarding In and Out parameters, and I feel that this aspect should be improved going ahead. We face issues with the API side, as Cloud Application Integration cannot handle large volumes; according to the API page, there is a limitation of 500 records or 500 MB. The AI integrated into the Informatica Intelligent Cloud Services solution is called Application Integration, where we still face challenges when dealing with huge volumes, as previously explained.
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Educational Organization
19%
Financial Services Firm
18%
Insurance Company
11%
Computer Software Company
9%
Educational Organization
42%
Computer Software Company
11%
Financial Services Firm
11%
Consumer Goods Company
6%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about IBM API Connect?
Publishers can easily identify, create, and publish APIs on the developer portal, defining plans, packages, and potentially billing rules.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for IBM API Connect?
Pricing depends on how many instances run across environments. I don't deal with licensing, but compared to other IBM products, the licensing is not significantly higher.
What needs improvement with IBM API Connect?
When comparing API Gateway with DataPower Gateway, several features in DataPower Gateway are absent in the APIC layer. Examples include the lack of connectivity to MQ ( /categories/message-queue-mq...
What do you like most about Informatica Intelligent Cloud Services?
The data integration and synchronization features in IICS improve the data handling processes.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Informatica Intelligent Cloud Services?
Regarding pricing, compared to other tools I have worked with, Informatica offers competitive pricing, which I find not high in terms of starting strategy.
What needs improvement with Informatica Intelligent Cloud Services?
There is a lot of improvement required, as we still face some cache issues most of the time, which is a challenge that we expect to see resolved in the future. Additionally, there is some limitatio...
 

Also Known As

No data available
Informatica IICS, IICS
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Heineken, Tine, Finologee, Axis Bank
2-1-1 San Diego, Hastings, AARP , Ace Hardware
Find out what your peers are saying about IBM API Connect vs. Informatica Intelligent Cloud Services and other solutions. Updated: April 2025.
857,162 professionals have used our research since 2012.