MicroStrategy vs SAP BusinessObjects Business Intelligence Platform comparison

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Comparison Buyer's Guide
Executive Summary
Updated on Nov 23, 2022

We performed a comparison between MicroStrategy and SAP BusinessObjects Business Intelligence Platform based on our users’ reviews in five categories. After reading all of the collected data, you can find our conclusion below.

  • Ease of Deployment: Both solutions receive mixed reviews regarding their initial setup.
  • Features: Reviewers of both products are happy with their stability and scalability.

    MicroStrategy users say it is a mature solution that is robust and simple to use, but they would like more internal visualization options.

    SAP BusinessObjects users say it has good reporting tools and integration options. Several users note, however, that its UI needs enhancement.
  • Pricing: Some MicroStrategy reviewers feel that the price is fair while others feel it is too high. SAP BusinessObjects reviewers say it is an expensive product.
  • ROI: Reviewers of both products report seeing an ROI.
  • Service and Support: MicroStrategy reviewers report being satisfied with the level of support they receive. Some SAP BusinessObjects reviewers say the support is good, but others say that the response times can be slow.

Comparison Results: MicroStrategy is the winner in this comparison. It is a robust, mature solution that receives high marks for its ease of use. In contrast, some SAP BusinessObjects reviewers note that its interface is lacking.

To learn more, read our detailed MicroStrategy vs. SAP BusinessObjects Business Intelligence Platform Report (Updated: September 2023).
734,024 professionals have used our research since 2012.
Featured Review
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 features of MicroStrategy are user-friendliness and integration with the different data warehouse systems.""It is a great tool and has the best offerings for doing data analysis.""MicroStrategy's best feature is that it is a user-friendly tool.""The feature I found most valuable is the drop and drag functionality available.""The simplicity of MicroStrategy is what I like the most.""The hyperintelligence is the most valuable feature.""The interactive features that appear in the report were good. The external rendering option they give with multi servers was also good.""MicroStrategy has what they call the Semantic Graph — an enterprise-grade semantic graph — and I think the technology is fantastic."

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"We find the product to be very stable.""One of the most valuable features of SAP BusinessObjects is that it's not a dashboarding solution. It's a real product. You can create operational reports and publish it to anyone. You can create schedules. You can create a Universe, semantic layers. There's also a security configuration. It's a huge product, so if there is a business need, SAP BusinessObjects can cover it.""The reports are most valuable. If it is a single-source universe, based on only one database, the performance, and the reporting tool is user-friendly, and users are very familiar with the tool and are comfortable using it.""SAP BusinessObjects Business Intelligence Platform's most valuable features are it has a great presentation layer. We can develop the presentation layer with drag-and-drop capabilities. For end-users and for our interns in the company can create reports and do their data analysis processes or works by using the objects that we created on the presentation layer by themselves.""We find that we can scale it as needed.""The most important feature of BusinessObjects is its integration with the SAP ERP system. If an organization is using SAP as its ERP system, and they want to do business intelligence, reporting, or analysis, SAP BusinessObjects is the only tool that I see doing that quite efficiently. That's because of the fact it is tightly integrated, and it gives a good user experience in terms of faster reporting. Its integration is the feature that I have found most valuable, but there are also other factors.""The solution is stable.""The feature that allows pivot users to create the report dashboards and run them when they want with a lot of flexibility with the drill-downs is very useful. The drill-down features are very good because, in other solutions, such as Excel, you have to create separate pivot tables and a lot of other operations to do drill-downs. SAP BusinessObjects Business Intelligence Platform tool does the drill-downs automatically. Overall the solution is user-friendly and has a lot of drag and drop features."

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Cons
"MicroStrategy needs to do some more development to make the platform easier to use. It's a complicated platform that requires a lot of skill to effectively utilize. So they could work on reducing the complexity to make it more accessible for a broader community of people.""Lacks decent visualization and the process for creating new objects needs to be simplified.""I would like to see more integration.""I would like to see the enterprise version available in a demo or as a trial version.""Data preparation-wise, it was not so straightforward with respect to getting different sources. Preparing or transforming the data inside and then bringing it onto the dashboard was a bit difficult, and the experience could have been better.""There needs to be better visualization.""The solution has a very non-logical user usage part. It has a library mode where users can access all the data, reports, and dashboards, but they also can be accessed from a platform. They have to log into the platform. The user experience is confusing for the users. MicroStrategy needs to define which one they will use. Some functionality isn’t available in library mode but is available in the portal. There should be Office integration. For example, if I do a presentation, then I should be able to add a chart to my presentation.""The pricing could be lower because it is costly."

More MicroStrategy Cons →

"The solution can improve by having more analytical features.""The initial setup could be simplified.""Most of the Apps right now are into dashboarding. This tool, for the Crystal Reports in the phase I'm primarily working on, does not have those dashboarding capabilities, like in the other advanced tools like Power BI or ClickView, and compared to them the dashboard generation is not that great.""SAP BusinessObjects Business Intelligence Platform is an outdated solution that is missing many features.""It is not simple to use.""SAP BusinessObjects Business Intelligence Platform should be made easier for the end-users and the performance could be improved.""It could be a lighter solution.""The performance could be improved, like when we extract a large amount of data."

More SAP BusinessObjects Business Intelligence Platform Cons →

Pricing and Cost Advice
  • "All BI software vendors' list prices are high. It's about a price that fits the customer's needs. And I think MicroStrategy has some flexibility in its pricing model where we can easily demonstrate a total cost of ownership comparison against any of the other players."
  • "There is no subscription, I am using the free version."
  • "I am unsure what the licensing costs are for this solution however, development costs are around $100,000 per year."
  • "The price of MicroStrategy is reasonable."
  • "We are waiting to switch to Microsoft Power BI because MicroStrategy is too costly."
  • More MicroStrategy Pricing and Cost Advice →

  • "The price and the pricing model are fine. We find the solution does not give us a lot of additional value."
  • "SAP is losing market to its competitors because of its costly user license and licensing model. They can do much better on the licensing side. That's what Microsoft has been doing, and that's why Power BI is gaining market share at the moment. SAP needs to relax a little bit on the licensing part. If Microsoft is giving people a solution that is half of the cost of SAP, people will definitely go with Power BI."
  • "SAP BusinessObjects Business Intelligence Platform is an expensive application."
  • "We are satisfied with the solution, but we are not satisfied with the licensing cost which SAP offers. They offer one lumpsum licensing which does everything. That is not the right strategy, because sometimes you don't have power users, they are only viewers, but we need to buy the full license for them. This is not something we want to continue with."
  • "There is an annual license to use SAP BusinessObjects Business Intelligence Platform."
  • "It is not a subscription model, but you must purchase a perpetual license for this."
  • "The SAP BusinessObjects Business Intelligence Platform has to improve its licensing cost."
  • More SAP BusinessObjects Business Intelligence Platform Pricing and Cost Advice →

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    Questions from the Community
    Top Answer:The solution is a very good enterprise tool with excellent enterprise functionality for security and user access. It also works perfectly in distribution, with everyone getting their own reports. It… more »
    Top Answer:We are waiting to switch to Microsoft Power BI because MicroStrategy is too costly. So, as for the pricing, I would rate it three out of ten, where one is high price, and ten is low price.
    Top Answer:The solution has a very non-logical user usage part. It has a library mode where users can access all the data, reports, and dashboards, but they also can be accessed from a platform. They have to log… more »
    Top Answer: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… more »
    Top Answer:Both tools have their positives and negatives. First, I should mention that I am relatively new to Tableau. I have been working on and off Tableau for about a year, but getting to work on it… more »
    Top Answer:The initial setup of SAP BusinessObjects Business Intelligence Platform was easy since the solution is user-friendly.
    Ranking
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    9,525
    Comparisons
    6,824
    Reviews
    11
    Average Words per Review
    456
    Rating
    8.1
    Views
    10,394
    Comparisons
    8,093
    Reviews
    31
    Average Words per Review
    653
    Rating
    7.8
    Comparisons
    Also Known As
    SAP BusinessObjects BI Platform, SAP BusinessObjects, Business Objects
    Learn More
    Overview

    Company: Founded in 1989, MicroStrategy (Nasdaq: MSTR) is a leading worldwide provider of enterprise software platforms. With direct operations in 26 countries worldwide and approximately 2,000 employees, our mission is to provide enterprise analytics, mobility, and security platforms that are flexible, powerful, scalable and user-friendly. To learn more, visit MicroStrategy online, and follow us on Facebook and Twitter.

    Product portfoilio:

    MicroStrategy 10 Secure Enterprise™ empowers leading organizations to analyze vast amounts of data and distribute actionable business insight throughout an enterprise through two distinct offerings: MicroStrategy Analytics™ and MicroStrategy Desktop™. MicroStrategy Analytics delivers reports and dashboards, and enables users to conduct ad hoc analysis and share insights anywhere, anytime, via mobile devices or the Web. It also combines the agility and productivity of self-service visual data discovery with the security, scalability, and governance features of enterprise-grade business intelligence. MicroStrategy Desktop is a standalone, on-premise visual data discovery tool designed to enable business users to analyze and understand their data. MicroStrategy Mobile™ enables organizations to rapidly build custom business applications that deliver analytics combined with transactions, multimedia, and custom workflows to mobile devices. MicroStrategy Secure Cloud™ combines all of the enterprise analytics, mobile, and security features in MicroStrategy 10 Secure Enterprise with powerful and scalable data integration, validation, and warehousing services — all delivered in an environment where organizations can deploy transformational analytics applications in minutes.

    Usher, MicroStrategy’s breakthrough security solution, is a powerful mobile security platform designed to dematerialize traditional forms of identity verification (such as passwords, tokens, and physical badges) and replace them with a single mobile identity badge that is cryptographically linked to its owner’s smartphone and dynamically linked to an enterprise’s existing identity repositories. Usher works on standard Android and iOS smartphones, and also boasts an Apple Watch™ integration.

    SAP BusinessObjects Business Intelligence Platform is a versatile and flexible solution for reporting and dashboards, focusing on analytics and ad hoc reporting. It can be deployed on-premise or in the cloud. The solution includes tools such as Web Intelligence, Crystal Reports, SAP Lumira, and Analytical Cloud and is primarily used for comprehensive business intelligence reporting.

    The most valuable features include excellent reporting features, good technical support, scalability, and the ability to translate database data into business language. The solution has helped organizations by providing analytics, monitoring KPIs, and making important decisions as a financial business.

    SAP BusinessObjects Business Intelligence Key Features

    • Central management: Access all your BI from a single, central launchpad that can be customized to meet user-specific needs. The launchpad provides business users with access to all their BI tools, reports, notifications, and applications in a single place. This includes the ability to launch SAP Analytics Cloud.

    • Data visualization and analytics: Create powerful visualizations, dashboards, and applications to assess risk, improve efficiency, identify opportunities, and enable users to analyze developments and data. Business insights can be shared with colleagues across enterprises.

    • Integration with Microsoft Office: Integrate with SAP Business Warehouse and SAP HANA to power real-time analytics. For large-scale data analysis, you can integrate with Microsoft Excel to discover in-depth business insights and forecasts. Data analytics information can also be embedded into Microsoft PowerPoint presentations.

    • Cloud support: Extend and expand your BI on the cloud. SAP Analytics Cloud connects your BI to the cloud and offers enterprise planning and advanced analytics from a single online solution.

    Reviews from Real Users

    SAP BusinessObjects BI stands out among its competitors for a number of reasons. Several major ones are its user-friendly dashboard, its impressive reporting and analytic features, and its ability to integrate with multiple solutions.

    A managing partner at a tech services company writes, "One of the most valuable features of SAP BusinessObjects is that it's not a dashboarding solution. It's a real product. You can create operational reports and publish it to anyone. You can create schedules. You can create a Universe, semantic layers. There's also a security configuration. It's a huge product, so if there is a business need, SAP BusinessObjects can cover it."

    An associate manager at a consultancy notes, "It provides flexibility for creating reports. It is very good for creating highly complex reports. I like this solution because when I buy BusinessObjects, it comes with many components, such as reporting, dashboard, and data visualization tools. Its performance is good. It is running on top of SAP BW and SAP HANA."

    A manager of data analytics and interfaces at a healthcare company says, "It has got great flexibility. As a reporting tool, it has a great deal of flexibility for numerous data resources that you can bring into it. It allows you to write your SQL query directly within the product. It has great visualization. 

    Offer
    Learn more about MicroStrategy
    Learn more about SAP BusinessObjects Business Intelligence Platform
    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.
    SRAM, Kennametal, Fairfax Water, British American Tobacco, Velux, and FedEx.
    Top Industries
    REVIEWERS
    Financial Services Firm16%
    Healthcare Company13%
    Retailer11%
    Government6%
    VISITORS READING REVIEWS
    Financial Services Firm16%
    Computer Software Company13%
    Retailer10%
    Insurance Company7%
    REVIEWERS
    Manufacturing Company18%
    Healthcare Company11%
    Energy/Utilities Company9%
    Insurance Company7%
    VISITORS READING REVIEWS
    Financial Services Firm13%
    Computer Software Company12%
    Government10%
    Manufacturing Company9%
    Company Size
    REVIEWERS
    Small Business22%
    Midsize Enterprise17%
    Large Enterprise61%
    VISITORS READING REVIEWS
    Small Business17%
    Midsize Enterprise11%
    Large Enterprise71%
    REVIEWERS
    Small Business29%
    Midsize Enterprise16%
    Large Enterprise55%
    VISITORS READING REVIEWS
    Small Business19%
    Midsize Enterprise11%
    Large Enterprise70%
    Buyer's Guide
    MicroStrategy vs. SAP BusinessObjects Business Intelligence Platform
    September 2023
    Find out what your peers are saying about MicroStrategy vs. SAP BusinessObjects Business Intelligence Platform and other solutions. Updated: September 2023.
    734,024 professionals have used our research since 2012.

    MicroStrategy is ranked 8th in BI (Business Intelligence) Tools with 11 reviews while SAP BusinessObjects Business Intelligence Platform is ranked 6th in BI (Business Intelligence) Tools with 31 reviews. MicroStrategy is rated 8.0, while SAP BusinessObjects Business Intelligence Platform is rated 7.8. The top reviewer of MicroStrategy writes "Good reports, easy to install, and is user-friendly". On the other hand, the top reviewer of SAP BusinessObjects Business Intelligence Platform writes "Integrates very well with SAP ERP, allows you to scale up or down anytime, and is absolutely trustworthy". MicroStrategy is most compared with Microsoft BI, Tableau, IBM Cognos, Qlik Sense and Oracle OBIEE, whereas SAP BusinessObjects Business Intelligence Platform is most compared with SAP Analytics Cloud, Microsoft BI, Oracle OBIEE, IBM Cognos and Oracle Essbase. See our MicroStrategy vs. SAP BusinessObjects Business Intelligence Platform report.

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    We monitor all BI (Business Intelligence) Tools 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.