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IBM Cloud Pak for Data vs Palantir Foundry comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Dec 19, 2024

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 Cloud Pak for Data
Ranking in Data Integration
19th
Average Rating
8.2
Reviews Sentiment
6.2
Number of Reviews
21
Ranking in other categories
Data Virtualization (3rd)
Palantir Foundry
Ranking in Data Integration
13th
Average Rating
7.8
Reviews Sentiment
7.0
Number of Reviews
18
Ranking in other categories
IT Operations Analytics (8th), Supply Chain Analytics (1st), Cloud Data Integration (10th), Data Migration Appliances (3rd), Data Management Platforms (DMP) (1st), Data and Analytics Service Providers (1st)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of May 2026, in the Data Integration category, the mindshare of IBM Cloud Pak for Data is 1.2%, down from 1.8% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Palantir Foundry is 2.1%, down from 2.8% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Data Integration Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
Palantir Foundry2.1%
IBM Cloud Pak for Data1.2%
Other96.7%
Data Integration
 

Featured Reviews

Raman Shihan - PeerSpot reviewer
Sr. Data Engineer at LTM
Unified data workflows have transformed how I manage sensitive analytics and end-to-end AI
One of the things that IBM Cloud Pak for Data does well is the data privacy and security that it offers. Since most of my data is very sensitive, IBM privacy framework helps me secure it very conveniently. In my experience, some of the best features that I encounter in IBM Cloud Pak for Data are the AI and Watson Assistant, which is very good. The analytics dashboard featuring all the recent history is very good with IBM. Searching for data through the unified search option is super cool. Among those features, the artificial intelligence that solves everything automatically stands out as most valuable in my day-to-day work, saving a lot of time. I can also store my data in many clouds with all the desired data. The customer service system is excellent and always willing to help. I would also add that the project analytics dashboard, ability to manage data across different cloud platforms, and end-to-end AI lifecycle are very great. IBM Cloud Pak for Data has positively impacted my organization by helping me see some return on investments. I have the ability to access all my data much quicker through the unified search option. It has also improved data security and governance in my organization very well. I've seen a 30% increase in productivity through the introduction of AI with IBM Cloud Pak for Data, which has really simplified a lot of operations that were manually tackled.
BA
Associate Vice President at a insurance company with 10,001+ employees
Unified data workflows have empowered collaborative analytics and streamlined AI development
Regarding points for improvement for Palantir Foundry, I see that they are improving day by day. In the last one to two years, I have seen many improvements compared to the two years that I have worked on Palantir Foundry. There are many things that come up, but a few things are not intuitive enough. Now that we are in this AI phase, Palantir Foundry has created some wrappers around the models, allowing us to create using a no-code application, chatbots, and LLM functions. The problem is that interaction with outside applications can be difficult with the current setup that Palantir Foundry has. There are ways to do that, but it is not that intuitive, which is what I feel.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"Cloud Pak is a very, very, very good system."
"The most valuable features of IBM Cloud Pak for Data are the Watson Studio, where we can initiate more groups and write code. Additionally, Watson Machine Learning is available with many other services, such as APIs which you can plug the machine learning models."
"One of Cloud Pak's best features is the Watson Knowledge Catalog, which helps you implement data governance."
"IBM Cloud Pak for Data is a very useful tool because it has the entire gamut of tools, starting from collecting the data from various sources using direct integration or through data virtualization and then organizing it into catalogs and applying their organization's policies or if they have other enforcement policies on top of that."
"IBM Watson Catalog and data pipelines are the most valuable features of the solution."
"IBM Cognos is very stable and has been around for many years, with many users familiar with it, making it a reliable solution for our institution."
"The most valuable feature of IBM Cloud Pak for Data is the Modeler flows. The ability to develop models using a graphical approach and the capability to connect to various sources, as well as the data virtualization capabilities, allow me to easily access and utilize data that is dispersed across different sources."
"The most valuable features are data virtualization and reporting."
"Great features available in one tool."
"The virtualization tool is useful."
"The ease of use is my favorite feature. We're able to build different models and projects or combine different projects to build one use case."
"Based on my huge experience with Palantir Foundry, I find that starting from the data connection to the end user application, there is a tool for everyone."
"The solution offers very good end-to-end capabilities."
"The solution provides an end-to-end integrated tech stack that takes care of all utility/infrastructure topics for you."
"It is easy to map out a workflow and run trigger-based scripts without having to deploy to another server."
"I rate Palantir Foundry a ten out of ten."
 

Cons

"The initial setup was a little complex. It is not that user-friendly, and it needs quite a bit of expertise to install, the installation between various different vendors is even more difficult, such as deploying it on the IBM Cloud is relatively easier than having it installed in Amazon AWS or Microsoft Azure, or similar cloud service."
"The two main challenges that I face are setup complexity and customer support responsiveness."
"Cloud Pak would be improved with integration with cloud service providers like Cloudera."
"The solution's user experience is an area that has room for improvement."
"One thing that bugs me is how much infrastructure Cloud Pak requires for the initial deployment. It doesn't allow you to start small. The smallest permitted deployment is too big. It's a huge problem that prevents us from implementing the solution in many scenarios."
"One challenge I'm facing with IBM Cloud Pak for Data is native features have been decommissioned, such as XML input and output. Too many changes have been made, and my company has around one hundred thousand mappings, so my team has been putting more effort into alternative ways to do things. Another area for improvement in IBM Cloud Pak for Data is that it's more complicated to shift from on-premise to the cloud. Other vendors provide secure agents that easily connect with your existing setup. Still, with IBM Cloud Pak for Data, you have to perform connection migration steps, upgrade to the latest version, etc., which makes it more complicated, especially as my company has XML-based mappings. Still, the XML input and output capabilities of IBM Cloud Pak for Data have been discontinued, so I'd like IBM to bring that back."
"There is a solution that is part of IBM Cloud Pak for Data called Watson OpenScale. It is used to monitor the deployed models for the quality and fairness of the results. This is one area that needs a lot of improvement."
"The tool depends on the control plane, an OpenShift container platform utilized as an orchestration layer...So, we have communicated this issue to IBM and asked if it is feasible to adapt the solution to work on a Kubernetes platform that we support."
"Compared to other hyperscalers, Palantir Foundry is complex and not so user-intuitive."
"The startup pricing is high, causing concern despite being cost-effective in terms of total cost of ownership."
"The solution could use more online documentation for new users."
"It requires a lot of manual work and is very time-consuming to get to a functional point."
"If you want to create new models on specific data sets, computing that is quite costly."
"The problem is that interaction with outside applications can be difficult with the current setup that Palantir Foundry has."
"I rate Palantir Foundry five out of 10. I'm ambivalent."
"The data lineage was challenging. It's hard to track data from the sources as it moves through stages. Informatica EDC can easily capture and report it because it talks to the metadata. This is generated across those various staging points."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"It's quite expensive."
"The solution is expensive."
"For the licensing of the solution, there is a yearly payment that needs to be made. Also, since it is expensive, cost-wise, I rate the solution an eight or nine out of ten."
"I think that this product is too expensive for smaller companies."
"IBM Cloud Pak for Data is expensive. If we include the training time and the machine learning, it's expensive. The cost of the execution is more reasonable."
"Cloud Pak's cost is a little high."
"The solution's pricing is competitive with that of other vendors."
"I don't have the exact licensing cost for IBM Cloud Pak for Data, as my company is still finalizing requirements, including monthly, yearly, and three-year licensing fees. Still, on a scale of one to five, I'd rate it a three because, compared to other vendors, it's more complicated."
"Palantir Foundry has different pricing models that can be negotiated."
"It's expensive."
"Palantir Foundry is an expensive solution."
"The solution’s pricing is high."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
20%
Manufacturing Company
10%
Computer Software Company
7%
University
5%
Manufacturing Company
13%
Financial Services Firm
9%
Government
8%
University
6%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business9
Large Enterprise18
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business4
Midsize Enterprise5
Large Enterprise13
 

Questions from the Community

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for IBM Cloud Pak for Data?
Regarding the price, I know IBM is traditionally relatively expensive in the Hungarian market, but we work together with the local IBM sales team, and on a project basis they manage to negotiate th...
What needs improvement with IBM Cloud Pak for Data?
I see room for improvement in IBM Cloud Pak for Data, as it lacked the lake house. However, IBM issued the new product which is Watsonx.data. This is a new product for IBM and it provides all the m...
What is your primary use case for IBM Cloud Pak for Data?
I believe IBM Cloud Pak for Data is suitable for mid-size to bigger companies. It is not tailored for smaller customers. My customers use IBM DataStage for ETL processes. One client has implemented...
What needs improvement with Palantir Foundry?
Regarding points for improvement for Palantir Foundry, I see that they are improving day by day. In the last one to two years, I have seen many improvements compared to the two years that I have wo...
What is your primary use case for Palantir Foundry?
There are several use cases that we are working on with Palantir Foundry. The first thing is for data model creation for all our data engineering pipelines. That is one use case. Palantir Foundry a...
What advice do you have for others considering Palantir Foundry?
The visualization part in Palantir Foundry works for me at least if I want to see how the data is structured and for an initial analysis, but I would say it is not as matured as Power BI or Tableau...
 

Also Known As

Cloud Pak for Data
No data available
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Qatar Development Bank, GuideWell, Skanderborg Music Festival
Merck KGaA, Airbus, Ferrari,United States Intelligence Community, United States Department of Defense
Find out what your peers are saying about IBM Cloud Pak for Data vs. Palantir Foundry and other solutions. Updated: April 2026.
895,272 professionals have used our research since 2012.