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MicroStrategy vs Oracle Essbase 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:
 

Categories and Ranking

MicroStrategy
Average Rating
8.2
Reviews Sentiment
6.8
Number of Reviews
161
Ranking in other categories
BI (Business Intelligence) Tools (8th), Embedded BI (3rd)
Oracle Essbase
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
5.5
Number of Reviews
14
Ranking in other categories
Database Development and Management (12th)
 

Mindshare comparison

MicroStrategy and Oracle Essbase aren’t in the same category and serve different purposes. MicroStrategy is designed for BI (Business Intelligence) Tools and holds a mindshare of 2.9%, down 3.8% compared to last year.
Oracle Essbase, on the other hand, focuses on Database Development and Management, holds 1.0% mindshare, up 1.0% since last year.
BI (Business Intelligence) Tools
Database Development and Management
 

Featured Reviews

AJIN S L - PeerSpot reviewer
Experience has shown effective features for analysis, but needs interface improvements
The most effective features of MicroStrategy for data analysis are those that cater to user needs. However, I find Power BI to be more useful when comparing some features, but my company does not choose Power BI due to certain code restrictions. The MicroStrategy interface is not as good as Power BI, especially concerning the user-friendly aspects.
Pratik Phapale - PeerSpot reviewer
Multidimensional cube structure enables complex data storage and Oracle consistently upgrades Essbase
It's definitely growing and has many great features, especially in the cloud. I haven't used the on-premises server as much. Multidimensional data processing: Essbase is a kind of backbone, or back end, for systems like Hyperion Planning and Hyperion Financial Management. It's a multidimensional cube where we can store and process details, generate reports, and do multiple data processing, which isn't possible in Oracle or other alternatives. So, I'm grateful for this experience. Continuous improvement: Recently, I faced a version upgrade from 11.1.2 to 11.4. Now I'm on 11.2.10. Essbase is continuously upgrading its features in different areas, like configuration, properties, and the cloud platform. It's great to have experience with this, as well as working with the fundamental parts of the VM sets.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"The most valuable feature is the ability to actually embed actions, comments, being able to leverage Transaction Services to embed the tool into a business process."
"I have never had any problems with the stability."
"We pretty much use the knowledge base.​ We feel that Microstrategy's community is a good forum to use."
"The product is very mature. It's quite robust and an excellent enterprise-level solution."
"Visual Insights (VI)"
"We have been using it mostly for grid reports and its exporting features."
"We leverage it, not only for reporting but for analytics and also for geospatial reporting."
"The most valuable features are drill down, dashboards, documents, bringing everything under one roof, and visualizations."
"Unlike relational, where you're linking together multiple tables, with Essbase, you basically define what the dimensions are beforehand, and you define the hierarchy, and then load the data. This allows you to do a pretty sophisticated analysis so that you can drill into it and slice and dice the data."
"I have found the most valuable aspect is the user-friendly environment and current features."
"The solution can handle a large volume of data."
"It helps us fetch specific data sets per users' requirements."
"It is highly efficient and easily scalable, particularly for handling large databases."
"It's a very powerful analytical engine with Essbase as the back end. We can analyze, transform, or utilize a big chunk of data for our calculations."
"Essbase is a kind of backbone, or back end, for systems like Hyperion Planning."
"The solution is stable and reliable."
 

Cons

"The solution lacks good visualization. They should work on the user interface to make it more slick and modern."
"There is room for improvement in data visualization."
"We have not invested nor are we planning to invest in MicroStrategy's mobile platform.​​"
"The areas that have room for improvement in MicroStrategy are mainly related to building additional tools. Specifically, the embedding process has been a bit of a struggle."
"It needs row-level security, column-level security, on attributes. I want to be able to handle full-scale security model from the semantic layer, flat out."
"They need to do a better job In its ability to allow end users to produce their own reports, metrics, and self-service business intelligence."
"They should give proper industry-based tutorials so that one can learn it easily and implement it based on the requirements. They should give more MMP files so that we can import a whole project altogether and learn from that project."
"It would be good if it had greater analytics so we could build these visualizations by ourselves with scripts."
"The reporting tool of Essbase needs improvement."
"The solution could enhance business analytics. I delved into the data using Oracle Essbase to create a new support tool."
"They should improve the solution's performance."
"The consolidation engine, which is HFM or FCCS, needs some room for improvement."
"Essbase has a programming language, and it has a couple of functions to do forecasting, however, their feature set for that is not that good."
"I would like to see an integration with application performance management and a version control management tool."
"It's an expensive product to use."
"The ability to drive external reporting out for development could be improved."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"​The solution is scalable. A little expensive perhaps, but it is scalable.​"
"​They gave us a good deal.​"
"The pricing list itself is not publicly accessible, so it's a bit opaque."
"The solution’s licensing cost is expensive."
"They made a change in the licensing module some time ago and we can now use all the enterprise tools for free."
"They offer yearly as well as perpetual licenses."
"The price of MicroStrategy is reasonable."
"There have been actual direct bottomline impacts in terms of extra revenue created from the reporting solutions."
"It is a costly solution."
"I believe the licensing is on a monthly base."
"Essbase is competitively priced."
"The solution is expensive."
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Comparison Review

it_user6330 - PeerSpot reviewer
May 2, 2013
MicroStrategy vs. Tableau
After a recent presentation, several attendees asked me about the applications of Visual Insights and Tableau. Many companies are investing in both tools and are trying to figure out the right tool for specific applications Tableau has found its sweet-spot as an agile discovery tool that analysts…
 

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
17%
Computer Software Company
11%
Retailer
8%
Insurance Company
7%
Financial Services Firm
23%
Computer Software Company
10%
Insurance Company
7%
Healthcare Company
6%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about MicroStrategy?
The stability of the product is good.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for MicroStrategy?
For larger businesses, I think the pricing is logical, but for smaller companies, it can be a bit costly.
What needs improvement with MicroStrategy?
Areas of MicroStrategy that have room for improvement include pricing because it is costly. Organizations that are well-established and have more money can afford MicroStrategy, but startups and mi...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Oracle Essbase?
It's not that expensive, but also not cheap. I'm not sure because it's a private license.
What needs improvement with Oracle Essbase?
If I got the opportunity to work with Hyperion, which is the best product, I would definitely go with that. The main concern is that Oracle is ending on-premises server support, so it would be bett...
What is your primary use case for Oracle Essbase?
We provide complete ownership of this application to Walmart projects. In the UK system, we support and develop for the Asda account, known as Eltham. We provide installation and support to over 50...
 

Also Known As

No data available
Essbase
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Allstate Insurance, Barneys New York, Boston Children's Hospital, Buenos Aires Department of the Treasury, Campbell Soup Company, DHL, eBay, eHarmony, Facebook, Four Seasons Hotels Inc., Godiva, Hard Rock International, LinkedIn, Netflix, Pfizer, SECO (Swiss Government Unemployment Agency), Starbucks, Texas A&M University, Thomson Reuters Markets, US House of Representatives, and the US Postal Service.
CHU de Rennes, Bellco Credit Union, Akindo Sushiro Co. Ltd, Deutsche Telekom AG, Samarco MineraÊo S.A., PCCW Ltd., QDQ media S.A.U., Boiron Italia, Specialized Bicycle Components Inc., Akindo Sushiro Co. Ltd., Air Canada, Daelim Industrial Co. Ltd.
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