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IBM Planning Analytics vs Pentaho Business Analytics comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive Summary

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
6.8
IBM Planning Analytics boosts budgeting productivity but faces challenges from rising costs, prompting some companies to explore alternatives.
Sentiment score
5.4
Pentaho Business Analytics mixed ROI perceptions highlight efficiency gains but unclear returns compared to competitors like QlikView and Tableau.
 

Customer Service

Sentiment score
6.0
IBM Planning Analytics support is positive, yet response times vary; documentation, training, and multi-level support are valued.
Sentiment score
6.5
Pentaho Business Analytics receives mixed reviews for customer support, with users relying heavily on forums and community assistance.
We have a multi-level support system, with the initial level handled by the company we bought the license from and subsequent support from IBM.
Instead, we rely on third-party partners recognized by IBM, who provide cost-effective support.
 

Scalability Issues

Sentiment score
7.5
IBM Planning Analytics excels in scalability and real-time data, though complexity and pricing pose challenges for some users.
Sentiment score
7.0
Pentaho Business Analytics is scalable with good performance but occasionally needs professional help for complex data handling.
Scalability is straightforward but it is pricey since it's a SaaS model priced per user.
Scalability is quite hard to implement in TM1, largely since the on-premise installation chosen back in 2014.
 

Stability Issues

Sentiment score
7.7
IBM Planning Analytics is stable and reliable, praised for robustness, supporting budgeting in various industries with few issues.
Sentiment score
6.5
Pentaho Business Analytics is stable but may face Java caching issues, impacting performance and requiring careful cache management.
This stability is really important as we use it for budget calculation, which is time-consuming.
It can handle large datasets.
 

Room For Improvement

IBM Planning Analytics needs improved integration, pricing, visualization, user interface, functionality, automation, design, speed, and predictive analytics support.
Pentaho Business Analytics lacks an intuitive interface, robust integration, self-service features, and requires technical expertise, limiting usability.
IBM's visualization needs significant improvement.
The abundance of features results in complexity, requiring strict guidelines for developers to ensure simplistic approaches are adhered to.
Pentaho Business Analytics is hard to learn and not suited for initial users as it requires knowledge of operating systems, Java, and other technical skills.
 

Setup Cost

Enterprise IBM Planning Analytics has setup costs from consulting fees and varied licensing, offering market-standard ROI and compatibility.
Enterprise buyers find the free Pentaho Community Edition cost-effective, while the Enterprise Edition offers value with support and features.
Given the product's old architecture and interface, they need to make it more affordable.
While IBM's solutions were costly before, the introduction of SaaS models has reduced prices significantly.
Pentaho Business Analytics is priced similarly to other competitors such as QlikView and Tableau.
 

Valuable Features

IBM Planning Analytics enhances planning with flexible design, Excel integration, sandbox testing, machine learning, and user-friendly interface.
Pentaho Business Analytics provides easy data integration, customizable dashboards, extensive connectivity, and supports efficient data transformation and delivery.
It also integrates machine learning and AI engines, enabling us to use algorithms for inventory forecasting which optimizes our inventory and replenishment rates.
Its stability helps controllers win time in their planning processes.
It is a stable product, and it can handle large datasets.
 

Categories and Ranking

IBM Planning Analytics
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
6.8
Number of Reviews
25
Ranking in other categories
Business Performance Management (4th)
Pentaho Business Analytics
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
6.7
Number of Reviews
45
Ranking in other categories
BI (Business Intelligence) Tools (19th), Cloud Operations Analytics (5th), Reporting (12th)
 

Mindshare comparison

While both are Business Intelligence solutions, they serve different purposes. IBM Planning Analytics is designed for Business Performance Management and holds a mindshare of 8.0%, down 9.5% compared to last year.
Pentaho Business Analytics, on the other hand, focuses on BI (Business Intelligence) Tools, holds 0.5% mindshare, down 0.6% since last year.
Business Performance Management
BI (Business Intelligence) Tools
 

Featured Reviews

Gnanavel-Chakkarapani - PeerSpot reviewer
Can easily create dashboards and helps businesses improve forecasting accuracy
The product has improved our company's forecasting accuracy since it serves as a very useful tool for our sales and controller teams as they easily get to enter the inputs using views in TM1, which gets loaded into our main database. If there are sales team members in different parts of the world, like in Hong Kong and Singapore, they may prefer to use IBM Planning Analytics, which is easy to use when compared to the Excel tool. Speaking about planning analytics and data analysis, I would say that our company used to use IBM Cognos Analytics for reporting, where we used to use Cognos Dynamic Cubes so that users can easily use its drag and drop features while getting to see the data for which the users had to wait for two to three minutes prior to its use. In our company, tons of data are loaded into the memory, and users can use Cognos Dynamic Cubes to analyze data and understand it. The AI capabilities of IBM have benefited our planning strategy as they are very useful for business. The tool allows the easy creation of dashboard reports using AI capabilities. No technical knowledge is required for business use cases. It is possible to integrate the product in scenarios where some new integrations are available. I remember that my company used Azure Data Factory to connect Azure, Oracle, and IBM WebSphere Application Server. When it comes to IBM Planning Analytics, it is complex to integrate it with LDAP and or any other authentication tool offered by Microsoft. In our company, some users like to integrate IBM Planning Analytics with the common LDAP or Microsoft AD, which we currently use for all our applications. The authentication part is difficult to configure with IBM Planning Analytics. The maintenance of the product is easy. My company has scheduled maintenance on the product every week, especially during forecast times, so that memories automatically lapse and users can freely access their servers. The use of the tool has had an impact on collaboration within our company's planning team since everyone knows how to easily access the data and publish the results. I recommend the product to those who plan to use it. I rate the tool a nine out of ten.
Mir Gulzar Ahmed - PeerSpot reviewer
Excels in handling unstructured data, helping organizations navigate through different storage systems
Pentaho can help organizations by providing them an insight of their unstructured data using one platform(Pentaho Business Analytics). The features are almost identical to other BIS platforms but to me, customers can benefit as it has a community version with most of its Enterprise features. It also has a free limited-period trial version. The other feature that I would like to share here is, that users have access to a complete spectrum of data from different sources with the system’s adaptive big data layer, which takes the source of the data into account. The software is built on an open architecture and can be integrated with multiple systems. However, Pentaho Data Integration and Analytics has been acquired by HDS which offers an Enterprise edition for organizations that also need to meet product compliance.
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Comparison Review

it_user6978 - PeerSpot reviewer
Jun 10, 2013
Jaspersoft vs. Pentaho – Which one to use & is there any need to purchase the commercial edition
Any company (be it technology, manfucaturing, human resource, ecommerce, SME etc) always has the need for Business Intelligence to some or the other extent. If cost is one of the consideration factor, then the 2 BI tools which are at the forefront are Pentaho and Jaspersoft. But, often the same…
 

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
16%
Manufacturing Company
11%
Retailer
7%
Computer Software Company
7%
Financial Services Firm
15%
Computer Software Company
9%
Educational Organization
8%
Manufacturing Company
7%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about IBM Planning Analytics?
The most valuable features of IBM Planning Analytics for streamlining planning processes include a unified database where all data are centralized.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for IBM Planning Analytics?
While IBM's solutions were costly before, the introduction of SaaS models has reduced prices significantly. Comparatively, IBM rates may be better than those of competitors, such as Hyperion ( /pro...
What needs improvement with IBM Planning Analytics?
IBM is behind competitors like Tableau ( /products/tableau-reviews ) and Power BI in terms of visualization. Their visuals are less innovative and practical with fewer varieties. IBM's visualizatio...
Seeking lightweight open source BI software
There are many...It would rather depend what System BI architecture or Enterprise legacy you have at your end...I would recommend as follows: 1) If you have legacies of SAP, Oracle - look for SAP...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Pentaho Business Analytics?
Pentaho Business Analytics offers the best value for money. While improvements can be made in some areas, particularly with more cloud-based solutions, it is not in their domain because they do not...
What needs improvement with Pentaho Business Analytics?
From an integration perspective, Pentaho Business Analytics is not the best tool on the market. There are things done by Apache that are better, though I am not the one implementing them, so this i...
 

Also Known As

Cognos TM1, IBM Cognos TM1
Pentaho, Kettle, Hitachi Pentaho Business Analytics
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

ManpowerGroup, Convergys, AIG, Orchard Brands, Citibank, InterGen, Northwestern University, EF Education First, Ironside, Bazan Group, CSOB Insurance, Macquarie Group, Charles Stanley, SATO, Government of Sint Maarten, BMW Financial Services
Cargo 2000 Lufthansa, Marketo, ModCloth, Cardiac Science, Telefonica, ExactTarget, Active Broadband Networks, and Brussels Airport.
Find out what your peers are saying about Oracle, Anaplan, IBM and others in Business Performance Management. Updated: August 2025.
865,164 professionals have used our research since 2012.