IBM Cloud Pak for Data vs SharePlex comparison

IBM and Quest Software are both solutions in the Data Integration category. IBM is ranked #24 with an average rating of 7.7, while Quest Software is ranked #47. IBM holds a 2.0% 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

2,349 Views
2,208 Comparison Views

86% willing to recommend

SharePlex

Read 5 SharePlex reviews

1,458 Views
1,006 Comparison Views

100% willing to recommend

IBM Cloud Pak for Data

SharePlex

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Executive SummaryUpdated on Aug 19, 2025

SharePlex and IBM Cloud Pak for Data are contenders in the data management solutions category. IBM Cloud Pak for Data appears to have the upper hand due to its comprehensive features, offering superior value despite a higher price point.

Features: SharePlex efficiently handles data replication with capabilities like Compare and Repair for maintaining data integrity, scales effectively with tools such as Post Enhancement Performance (PEP) for transaction handling, and offers reliability in data synchronization and transfer. IBM Cloud Pak for Data stands out with Watson Studio for initiating code groups, data virtualization and reporting, and powerful governance features provided by the Watson Knowledge Catalog.

Room for Improvement: SharePlex could enhance its analytics capabilities and governance integration, improve deployment customization options, and provide more AI integration features. IBM Cloud Pak for Data requires streamlining of its deployment to reduce complexity, enhancing user-friendliness for smaller projects, and offering more competitive pricing options for mid-sized businesses.

Ease of Deployment and Customer Service: SharePlex is known for its straightforward deployment process and reliable customer service, offering users a hassle-free setup experience. IBM Cloud Pak for Data, while offering a more customizable deployment, presents a learning curve that can be challenging, although backed by comprehensive support which is advantageous for larger implementations.

Pricing and ROI: SharePlex offers a more attractive pricing model with lower upfront costs and faster ROI thanks to its simple functionalities. IBM Cloud Pak for Data, although demanding a higher initial investment, offers extensive capabilities and potential for greater long-term value for large-scale projects.

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

Buyer's Guide

IBM Cloud Pak for Data vs. SharePlex

July 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

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)

SharePlex

Ranking in Data Integration

47th

Average Rating

9.0

Reviews Sentiment

7.3

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

No ranking in other categories

Mindshare comparison

As of August 2025, in the Data Integration category, the mindshare of IBM Cloud Pak for Data is 2.0%, up from 1.7% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of 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.

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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.

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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

"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."

"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."

"One of Cloud Pak's best features is the Watson Knowledge Catalog, which helps you implement data governance."

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

"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."

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

"IBM Watson Catalog and data pipelines are the most valuable features of the solution."

More IBM Cloud Pak for Data pros

"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 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."

"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."

"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."

Cons

"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 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."

"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 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."

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

"The solution could have more connectors."

"The solution's catalog searching or map search needs to be improved."

"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."

More IBM Cloud Pak for Data cons

"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."

"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 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."

Pricing and Cost Advice

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

"It's quite expensive."

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

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

"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."

"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 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."

"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."

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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Financial Services Firm

30%

Manufacturing Company

11%

Computer Software Company

Government

Financial Services Firm

20%

Computer Software Company

10%

Manufacturing Company

Retailer

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.

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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.

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What needs improvement with IBM Cloud Pak for Data?

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Comparisons

IBM InfoSphere DataStage vs IBM Cloud Pak for Data

Compared 40% of the time

Denodo vs IBM Cloud Pak for Data

Compared 12% of the time

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

Compared 10% of the time

Azure Data Factory vs IBM Cloud Pak for Data

Compared 9% of the time

Palantir Foundry vs IBM Cloud Pak for Data

Compared 8% of the time

More IBM Cloud Pak for Data Competitors

Oracle GoldenGate vs SharePlex

Compared 58% of the time

Qlik Replicate vs SharePlex

Compared 16% of the time

AWS Database Migration Service vs SharePlex

Compared 10% of the time

Fivetran vs SharePlex

Compared 8% of the time

IBM App Connect vs SharePlex

Compared 8% of the time

More SharePlex Competitors

Product Reports

Buyer's Guide

IBM Cloud Pak for Data

August 2025

Download IBM Cloud Pak for Data product report

Buyer's Guide

SharePlex

August 2025

Download 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 delivers robust database replication and migration capabilities, emphasizing performance, synchronization, and data integrity management. Supporting high availability and real-time data syncing, it serves organizations handling vast transaction volumes, especially in IoT data processing.

SharePlex offers reliable data transfer and efficient multi-target replication. Its features like Compare and Repair utilities assist in maintaining data consistency. With PEP fostering scalability for large transactions, it caters to businesses aiming to cut down migration windows and minimize outages. Users employ SharePlex in real-time syncing and failover scenarios across data centers, crucial for handling extensive transaction data during migrations or upgrades.

What are SharePlex's key features?

Core Replication: Ensures reliable data synchronization across multiple targets.
Data Integrity Management: Maintains accuracy during reading and writing processes.
Compare and Repair Utilities: Facilitate data consistency checks and fixes.
PEP: Enhances performance for large transaction volumes.

Why consider SharePlex for your database needs?

Scalability: Supports large-scale transactions with efficiency.
Minimized Downtime: Provides continuous data availability during operations.
Business Continuity: Enables seamless failover and data center transitions.
Real-time Syncing: Supports time-sensitive data processing requirements.

Organizations in sectors like finance and telecommunications implement SharePlex to maintain uninterrupted operations and ensure quick recovery times. By facilitating database migrations to cloud platforms like AWS, they achieve reduced downtime and enhanced operational efficiency, catering to the rigorous demands of data-driven industries.

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. SharePlex

July 2025

Free Report: IBM Cloud Pak for Data vs. SharePlex

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