IBM Cloud Pak for Data vs Quest SharePlex comparison

IBM and Quest Software are both solutions in the Data Integration category. IBM is ranked #24 with an average rating of 8.0, while Quest Software is ranked #48. IBM holds a 1.9% mindshare in DI, compared to Quest Software’s 0.7% mindshare. Additionally, 86% of IBM users are willing to recommend the solution, compared to 100% of Quest Software users who would recommend it.

IBM Cloud Pak for Data

Read 13 IBM Cloud Pak for Data reviews

2,494 Views
1,410 Comparison Views

86% willing to recommend

Quest SharePlex

Read 5 Quest SharePlex reviews

1,163 Views
666 Comparison Views

100% willing to recommend

IBM Cloud Pak for Data

Quest SharePlex

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Download the report

Executive SummaryUpdated on Dec 19, 2024

Quest SharePlex and IBM Cloud Pak for Data are both key players in the data management and integration market. Quest SharePlex is stronger in cost efficiency and customer support, while IBM Cloud Pak for Data leads in feature set and comprehensive solutions.

Features: Quest SharePlex offers database replication, reliable data transfer, and performance-enhancing tools like PEP for handling high transaction volumes. IBM Cloud Pak for Data features Watson Studio for AI, data virtualization for integration, and Watson Knowledge Catalog for data governance, along with comprehensive analytics.

Room for Improvement: Quest SharePlex may benefit from enhancing cloud integration, expanding analytics capabilities, and improving UI for complex operations. IBM Cloud Pak for Data could improve deployment simplicity, lower entry cost for smaller organizations, and offer deeper offline support.

Ease of Deployment and Customer Service: Quest SharePlex provides straightforward deployment and fast, effective customer service. IBM Cloud Pak for Data, despite a more complex deployment due to its cloud infrastructure, offers competent customer support to manage these complexities.

Pricing and ROI: Quest SharePlex is cost-effective, offering a quicker return on investment ideal for budget-conscious users. IBM Cloud Pak for Data justifies its higher price with advanced analytics and AI, promising a substantial return for enterprises seeking expansive functionality.

To learn more, read our detailed IBM Cloud Pak for Data vs. Quest SharePlex Report (Updated: June 2025).

Buyer's Guide

IBM Cloud Pak for Data vs. Quest SharePlex

June 2025

Download the complete report

Helped 859,438 peers since 2012

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

24th

Average Rating

7.8

Reviews Sentiment

6.5

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

Data Virtualization (3rd)

Quest SharePlex

Ranking in Data Integration

48th

Average Rating

9.0

Reviews Sentiment

7.3

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

No ranking in other categories

Mindshare comparison

As of June 2025, in the Data Integration category, the mindshare of IBM Cloud Pak for Data is 1.9%, up from 1.7% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Quest SharePlex is 0.7%, up from 0.7% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.

Data Integration

Featured Reviews

Michelle Leslie

Data asset management engineer at a tech services company with 1-10 employees

Starts strong with data management capabilities but needs a demo database

What I would love to see is an end-to-end, almost a training demo database of some sort, where one of the biggest problems with data management is demonstrated. There are so many components to data management, and more often than not, people understand one thing really well. They may understand DataStage and how to move data around, but they do not see the impact of moving data incorrectly. They also do not see the impact of everyone understanding a piece of data in the same way. I would love Cloud Pak to come with a demo database that illustrates the different components of data management in a logical way, so I can see the whole picture instead of just the area I'm specializing in. It would be great if Cloud Pak, from a data modeling point of view, allowed us to import our PDMs, for example. It would be ideal to import and create business terms in Cloud Pak. The PEA would be great to create the technical data. The association between the business and the technical metadata could then be automated by pulling it through from your ACE models. The data modeling component is available in Cloud Pak. Additionally, when it comes to Cloud Pak, even though it has the NextGen DataStage built into it, there is Cloud Pak for data integration as well. Currently, I do not think we have a full enough understanding of how CP4D and CP4I can enhance each other.

Read full review

Kristopher Wells

Oracle DBA at Broadridge Financial Solutions, Inc.

It reduces the downtime and migration time exponentially

I would rate SharePlex's high availability, and disaster recovery features highly. It works as advertised in terms of rapid fill-over and switch-over opportunities. It reduces the migration time for a multi-terabyte database to an hour or less because it performs real-time replication. SharePlex reduces downtime and migration time exponentially. Something that could take 12 to 24 hours is cut down to one to two hours. By the time you start to migrate, the only remaining replication is a slight difference in data from the point when SharePlex has shut down, and the application has to also switch over to the new database. It allowed the company to replicate data more transparently. Some of the business executives probably don't even know it's there. It works 100 percent of the time, with little downtime or problems. It provides what is needed. There's little concern about whether or not it functions. It's allowed the company to achieve its objectives with its clients, reducing and minimizing downtime for substantial migrations and upgrades. It can reduce hardware and storage costs, but my company doesn't utilize it with high-availability architecture.

Read full review

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"What I found most helpful in IBM Cloud Pak for Data is containerization, which means it's easy to shift and leave in terms of moving to other clouds. That's an advantage of IBM Cloud Pak for Data."

"Its data preparation capabilities are highly valuable."

"It is a scalable solution, and we have had no issues with its scalability in our company. I rate the solution's scalability a nine out of ten."

"The most valuable features are data virtualization and reporting."

"I love the way that I can start at a very basic level with my data management journey by capturing my policies, justifying my data, and putting them into different categories to say this is data relating to individuals, for example, or data relating to geography."

"You can model the data there, connect the data models with the business processes and create data lineage processes."

"Cloud Pak's most valuable features are IBM MQ, IBM App Connect, IBM API Connect, and ISPF."

"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."

More IBM Cloud Pak for Data pros

"The core replication and its performance. Performance is crucial, and SharePlex is by far the fastest. The way it handles replication to multiple targets along with basic filtering, as well as from multiple sources to a single target, is very efficient."

"I like SharePlex's Compare and Repair tool."

"Because of the volume of the transactions, we heavily use a feature that allows SharePlex to replicate thousands of transactions. It's called PEP, Post Enhancement Performance, and that has helped us scale tremendously."

"There are some capabilities within SharePlex where you can see how the data is migrating and if it still maintains good data integrity. For example, if there are some tables that get out of sync, there are ways to find them and fix the problem on the spot. Since these are very common issues, we can easily fix these types of problems using utilities, like compare and repair. So, if you find something is out of sync, then you can just repair that table. It basically syncs that table from source to target to see if there are any differences. It will then replicate those differences to the target."

"The core features of the solution we like are the reliability of the data transfer and the accuracy of data read and write. The stability of the solution is also excellent."

Cons

"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 setup cost is very expensive. The cost depends on the pieces of the solution I'm using, how much data I have, and whether it's on the cloud or on-prem."

"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."

"The product is trying to be more maturity in terms of connectors. That, I believe, is an area where Cloud Pak can improve."

"The solution's user experience is an area that has room for improvement."

"What I would love to see is an end-to-end, almost a training demo database of some sort, where one of the biggest problems with data management is demonstrated."

"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."

"Cloud Pak would be improved with integration with cloud service providers like Cloudera."

More IBM Cloud Pak for Data cons

"I would like the solution to have some kind of machine learning and AI capabilities. Often, if we want to improve the performance of posting, we have to bump up a parameter. That means we need to stop the process, come up with a figure that we want to bump the parameter up to, and then start SharePlex. Machine learning and AI capabilities for these kinds of improvement would tremendously help boost productivity for us."

"I would like more ability to automate installation and configuration in line with some of the DevOps processes that are more mature in the market. That would be a considerable improvement."

"The reporting features need improvement. It would be very good for users to have a clear understanding of the status of replication."

"For its function in relation to replication (i.e. filtering), I'd give it a six or seven out of 10. GoldenGate has much more functionality by comparison."

"I don't know how easy it would be to change the architecture in an already implemented replication. For example, if we have a certain way of architecting for a particular database migration and want to change that during a period of time, is that an easy or difficult change? There was a need for us to change the architecture in-between the migration, but we didn't do it. We thought, "This is possibly complicated. Let's not change it in the middle because we were approaching our cutover date." That was one thing that we should have checked with support about for training."

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The solution is expensive."

"The solution's pricing is competitive with that of other vendors."

"Cloud Pak's cost is a little high."

"It's quite expensive."

"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."

"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."

"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."

"I think that this product is too expensive for smaller companies."

"It is not as expensive as Oracle GoldenGate and has worked really well within our budgets."

"It's really good value for the money. There are some things they could improve on, but in terms of the pricing, features, and support, as a holistic package, we are not thinking of anything else at this point in time."

See which vendors are best for you

Use our free recommendation engine to learn which Data Integration solutions are best for your needs.

See recommendations

859,438 professionals have used our research since 2012.

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Financial Services Firm

30%

Manufacturing Company

10%

Computer Software Company

10%

Government

Financial Services Firm

20%

Computer Software Company

12%

Manufacturing Company

Healthcare Company

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

No data available

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about IBM Cloud Pak for Data?

DataStage allows me to connect to different data sources.

See all answers

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for IBM Cloud Pak for Data?

The setup cost is very expensive. The cost depends on the pieces of the solution I'm using, how much data I have, and whether it's on the cloud or on-prem.

See all answers

What needs improvement with IBM Cloud Pak for Data?

See all answers

Ask a question

Earn 20 points

Comparisons

IBM InfoSphere DataStage vs IBM Cloud Pak for Data

Compared 40% of the time

Informatica Intelligent Data Management Cloud (IDMC) vs IBM Cloud Pak for Data

Compared 15% of the time

Denodo vs IBM Cloud Pak for Data

Compared 13% of the time

Azure Data Factory vs IBM Cloud Pak for Data

Compared 10% of the time

Palantir Foundry vs IBM Cloud Pak for Data

Compared 9% of the time

More IBM Cloud Pak for Data Competitors

Oracle GoldenGate vs Quest SharePlex

Compared 61% of the time

Qlik Replicate vs Quest SharePlex

Compared 14% of the time

AWS Database Migration Service vs Quest SharePlex

Compared 10% of the time

Fivetran vs Quest SharePlex

Compared 8% of the time

IBM App Connect vs Quest SharePlex

Compared 7% of the time

More Quest SharePlex Competitors

Product Reports

Buyer's Guide

IBM Cloud Pak for Data

June 2025

Download IBM Cloud Pak for Data product report

Buyer's Guide

Quest SharePlex

June 2025

Download Quest SharePlex product report

Also Known As

Cloud Pak for Data

Dell SharePlex, SharePlex

Overview

IBM Cloud Pak® for Data is a fully-integrated data and AI platform that modernizes how businesses collect, organize and analyze data to infuse AI throughout their organizations. Cloud-native by design, the platform unifies market-leading services spanning the entire analytics lifecycle. From data management, DataOps, governance, business analytics and automated AI, IBM Cloud Pak for Data helps eliminate the need for costly, and often competing, point solutions while providing the information architecture you need to implement AI successfully.

Building on the streamlined hybrid-cloud foundation of Red Hat® OpenShift®, IBM Cloud Pak for Data takes advantage of the underlying resource and infrastructure optimization and management. The solution fully supports multicloud environments such as Amazon Web Services (AWS), Azure, Google Cloud, IBM Cloud™ and private cloud deployments. Find out how IBM Cloud Pak for Data can lower your total cost of ownership and accelerate innovation.

IBM

SharePlex database replication empowers your organization to achieve its database goals now and into the future. Make use of built-in monitoring, conflict resolution, data comparison and synchronization capabilities backed by award-winning support.

Quest Software

Sample Customers

Qatar Development Bank, GuideWell, Skanderborg Music Festival

Bodybuilding.com, Priceline.com, Ameco Beijing, Viasat, SK Broadband

Buyer's Guide

IBM Cloud Pak for Data vs. Quest SharePlex

June 2025

Free Report: IBM Cloud Pak for Data vs. Quest SharePlex

Find out what your peers are saying about IBM Cloud Pak for Data vs. Quest SharePlex and other solutions. Updated: June 2025.

DOWNLOAD NOW

859,438 professionals have used our research since 2012.

See our IBM Cloud Pak for Data vs. Quest SharePlex report.

See our list of best Data Integration vendors.

We monitor all Data Integration reviews to prevent fraudulent reviews and keep review quality high. We do not post reviews by company employees or direct competitors. We validate each review for authenticity via cross-reference with LinkedIn, and personal follow-up with the reviewer when necessary.