What is our primary use case?
We are using it for job scheduling, shift scheduling, etc. It is pretty much orchestrating all the job shifts for the IT team or core team.
We specialize in security, which means 24/7 your system or team needs to be ready for anything or anybody in the world, independent of even time differences. If you are managing your client's services from Europe, or anywhere else in the world, Control-M makes it easier to do scheduling, saving people time.
Since we have different satellite offices in Toronto and Ottawa, we use different role accessibility in different locations. That is why we are using it on-premise. However, in the next six months or so, we are planning to go to a hybrid cloud environment on Control-M since we are adding two or more satellite offices. We think that it will be more manageable if we implement it in a hybrid cloud environment.
How has it helped my organization?
The solution is innovative. Specifically for the overseas and time differences, you can feel the efficiency of Batch Impact Manager on jobs, batch processing, and impact management. It works the best on these kinds of issues. It saves us time and money, which is important. We save a lot using Control-M.
The most important thing is it is easy to manage conversions and stuff. It is easy to convert different systems, like AWS, which saves time.
We are working with vendors, partners, and clients to manage GDPR and data privacy. This solution is good with data privacy because BMC is GDPR compliant. That is very important, especially for overseas clients and businesses.
Overall, Control-M is quite critical for our business. I would rate this as nine out of 10.
What is most valuable?
- The monitoring
- Workflows
- Production
- Scheduling the shifts
- Timeframes for specific roles and management
Time differences are important because we have some overseas clients. That is why we are using Batch Impact Manager for the Control-M, which is very helpful for us. It detects potential blocks in advance, delays, and errors. That helps us to optimize the scheduling, then the batch workload processing as well.
It is pretty easy to create, integrate, and automate data pipelines. It is user-friendly, not rocket science. That is what I like about the Control-M, and specifically Batch Impact Manager. You will need some orientation and need to know what you are doing if you are integrating your system, and this solution makes it easier.
We use Control-M Python Client and cloud data service integrations with GCP, which is pretty hassle-free. There aren't any problems or compliance issues. It is pretty easy to retrieve the data, do conversions, etc. They are on-time, and there is not much of a delay.
The engineers on our team say that it is pretty easy to build, test and promote data workflows with the data coding language integrated into Control-M through the Control-M automation API. The ease of integration is eight out of 10. Python is the main language that our database managers and data engineers are using along with some other languages.
The Control-M interface is user-friendly and easy to use. Orientation-wise, it is easy for data engineers to adapt.
What needs improvement?
Ingesting and processing data from different platforms can be a challenge. Control-M does allow integration for this with other systems to make this easier. For example, we integrate Control-M with an in-house system to do this.
I am unsure if Control-M is compliant with Microsoft Azure environment integrations. We have some clients in Azure environments. Specifically, in Canada, government agencies and nonprofits mostly use Microsoft Azure.
For how long have I used the solution?
I have been using it for almost a year and a half.
What do I think about the stability of the solution?
The stability is very good. My impressions of the stability are very positive.
What do I think about the scalability of the solution?
I would rate the scalability as nine out of 10.
How are customer service and support?
The technical support is near perfect. I would rate them as nine and a half out of 10.
How would you rate customer service and support?
Which solution did I use previously and why did I switch?
We were previously using an in-house solution, but we weren't improving it much, which is why we switched to Control-M.
What was our ROI?
Control-M creates cost-efficiencies, saves time on scheduling and data efficiency, and provides better data management. We use the managed services as well because we partner with some clients at MSPs and MSSPs. This solution is also good for their environment because it is easy to access, retrieve, and work with actionable data as well as all the procedures and processes. It is good and works. I would rate it as eight out of 10.
The total cost of ownership is impacted by the Control-M pricing as well as the overall cost of the procedures and daily batch processing. We can easily see that at the end of the year, in terms of big time and money savings.
What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?
The pricing and licensing could be better. However, when I compare Control-M pricing with JAMS, Control-M is still better priced than JAMS enterprise.
Which other solutions did I evaluate?
We also evaluated JAMS Scheduler, which is also a workload automation solution. The pricing for Control-M was better and has good predictive maintenance that is better than JAMS. Control-M is also more integrated with Google for different solutions.
What other advice do I have?
Control-M is better for the cloud. Specifically, the hybrid cloud is the best. On-premise is still okay, but it depends. Its hybrid cloud environment works better and is optimized in a better way to save money and time. Its implementation is easy from the cloud GCP and AWS. Microsoft Azure is not there yet, but otherwise, it is perfect.
I would rate the solution as nine out of 10.
Which deployment model are you using for this solution?
On-premises
Disclosure: PeerSpot contacted the reviewer to collect the review and to validate authenticity. The reviewer was referred by the vendor, but the review is not subject to editing or approval by the vendor.