MicroStrategy Reviews

• Multi-user development environment: allows several power users to be changing the metadata, which accelerates development. Oracle BI doesn't allow this, for instance.
• Stability
• High-performance queries
• Flexibility
• Internal analytical functions
• Ease of integration with other systems
• Ease of dashboard design

• Quick time to market of analytical solutions
• In-depth, user-friendly business analysis

Simplify dashboard design; it is very powerful, but sometimes it might be like using a cannon to kill a mosquito, depending on the situation. Perhaps it is simpler in the newer version.

From my experience, the Dahsboard design from Microstrategy v9i was
very powerful and flexible. It was a "pixel perfect" design, but comparing
with other reporting platforms like Tableau and Qlik and OBIEE it is more
complex. I believe it is very good, but it needs some technical expertise
(Power User) to be fully autonomous.

I have used it for nine months.

I encountered minor stability issues.

I have not encountered any scalability issues.

Technical support is quick and efficient.

This depends on the client's needs and existing IT systems.

Initial setup is straightforward.

It is expensive, but there is a good quality-price relationship.

Before choosing this product, we also evaluated QlikView and Tableau.

Consider it in terms of flexibility to manage and develop user-friendly and powerful interfaces for end users.

MicroStrategy has a lot of features. If the developers and end-users know how to use it in depth, it is one awesome BI tool.

MicroStrategy Architect is kind of a data modelling tool available in the MicroStrategy Desktop. It is used to maintain the relationships among the attributes. It is a really useful tool, especially when you have to modify the relationships/hierarchies; you do not need to go to the database to do the changes. Instead, you can use this architect to define them.

MSTR generates SQL automatically for every object you pull on to the report. It has many options available in the VLDB properties where you can optimize the SQL.

Web is an amazing tool for end users. You can customize the reports, create new ad-hoc reports, modify the existing static reports and apply sorting, filtering, pivoting, etc. Admins can define the access levels to the users based on their right to view/modify the sensitive data. Access levels can be defined at many levels; at project level, folder level, report level to the developers, standard users, project owners/directors.

The security filters concept was very useful for our requirements. It was like we had to use same database tables (backend) and report structure (frontend) for different countries but each country should not see the others’ data. In this case, we can apply security filters in the web environment to the user groups specific to the country.

Data blending is also a good feature. With this, you can insert objects from more than one dataset in a single grid or graph in the dashboard. This allows users to create their own custom dashboards from multiple datasets.

The visual insight tool can be improved further. When I tried with Tableau, it has a wide variety of graphs to generate quick and easy.

The graphical interpretations developed from the reports are not directly usable for dynamic analysis and formatting takes longer. the graphs do not indicate trends on their own. Whereas in Tableau, developing dashboards from the scratch is easy and super fast and dashboards look great without formatting.

But I heard MSTR version 10 has come up with many features; yet to try.

I have used it for five years.

I have not encountered any stability issues so far.

I have not encountered any scalability issues so far.

I am not really a great fan of tech support, because my project’s issues didn't get solved or the response was not quick.

However, there is a discussion forum on the MicroStrategy Community site. You can post any technical/tool-based questions and you will get a fast response. It also has a knowledge base, which has many posts/tech notes written to provide solutions to the different kinds of problems. This community is really awesome, with many blogs/articles on MSTR.

MicroStrategy was the first tool I worked on in five years. But I would probably switch to Tableau if I needed to work on visual insights and utilize a variety of graphs.

Initial setup was quite straightforward and easier to me.

The price is too high. They could at least increase the software evaluation period.

We didn't evaluate any other tools; the requirements we received from customers instructed us to work with MSTR.

MSTR is a great tool for reporting. Especially for big organisations, it is very stable. Training is a must for the developers who want to play with the options available in and out of the tool.

• Rapid development: Once you have data, it is pretty fast to develop dashboards that are available in both web and mobile environments. It is quite easy to develop in days.
• Enterprise readiness

• Management's ability to slice and dice data quickly with ease

Any product/feature request takes years to get, if at all. This really pulls the rating down overall.

For example, the MSTR prompt interface sucks, where users can enter details to get data. However, they do not seem to be too worried about modifying it. Selector preferences cannot be stored per user. Prompts can be saved per user but that interface sucks.

Also, multiple currencies are handled poorly even after introducing two or more datasets in a document.

I have used it for more than two years.

I have not encountered any stability issues. We have four servers with DR capability.

I have not encountered any scalability issues.

We got MSTR Services to set it up.

With V10, they made life easier for licensing; bargain and do not take the quote as serious.

Before choosing this product, I evaluated MicroStrategy, Cognos 8/9, Tableau’s very early versions and QlikView.

It is good enterprise-level software. Consider Tableau and Qlik before making your decision. Evaluate your user readiness. For example, to use Tableau, the users should be more on the power users side. MicroStrategy is better if management is not tech savvy.

I have always admired how MicroStrategy has continued to strive on one particular aspect, simplification, yet not compromise on its robustness. The mobile features have proven to be the most valuable to me. Their Mobile solution is one of the best in the BI industry when it comes to quality, presentation, out-of-the-box features and ease of development. My client has fully adapted to this solution and we are extremely pleased with the end results.

In the past, our sales VP and directors will bring their laptop loaded with Excel sheets whenever they meet with their clients, but that has now been replaced with an iPad using the MicroStrategy Mobile solution. The BI application now is able to provide the analytics and visualizations required to empower our VPs and directors to make informed decisions in real time with their clients. The application has also helped identify the weak links within the sales structure.

If I were to pick a few areas with room for improvement, I would suggest the following:

• It would be nice to have more visualizations available for the user community right out the box instead of using the D3 plugin.
• It would be nice to have more features packed with the ESRI Map engine that is supported right out the box.
• MicroStrategy Operations Manager needs improvement from a visualization and stability perspective. (This is a new feature that was introduced in MicroStrategy 10.)

I've used it for 12 years, implementing MicroStrategy solutions for both government and corporate clients.

I have been involved with implementing MicroStrategy Solution for over 12 years and I have worked with other BI solution providers (IBM Cognos, SAP BusinessObjects, SAS BI) while contracting for the government. In my experience, MicroStrategy have had the greatest uptime percentile when it comes to stability compared to the rest of the tools. I've seen great improvement in stability, especially in versions 9 and 10. It is a stable tool when it’s deployed and configured as recommended.

The MicroStrategy solution is very scalable. An organization can start out with limited licensing and grow more robust without compromising on the performance.

I would say their technical support quality has been a little questionable lately and I have brought up our concerns to their regional director. MicroStrategy has acknowledged my concerns and assured me that they are working towards providing a better quality of support.

I started my career with MicroStrategy and have not worked with a different solution before. On the other hand, I was involved in a project where we switched from another BI solution, Cognos, to MicroStrategy, while contracting for a government entity.

MicroStrategy’s implementation has always been very straightforward and the organization has continued to strive to simplify the whole deployment process. It requires minimal support from other IT personnel.

MicroStrategy licensing structure has been recently revamped and in my opinion, they have done a great job. From a cost perspective, it’s pretty competitive, but one thing to keep in mind is the fact that you don’t need to hire a ton of consultants to manage this application.

Before choosing this product, I did not evaluate other options.

MicroStrategy has always been one of the top leaders in the business intelligence industry and they have worked hard to provide new breakthroughs in the industry. There are other BI tools that can potentially provide a better solution for various reasons but in my opinion, they are very much focused on a specific area. If you are looking into a tool that offers the full suite of business intelligence needs, you will never go wrong with MicroStrategy.

Hands-down: Object-oriented metadata architecture.

Why? Allows the re-use of objects throughout the platform, resulting in fast development, need for smaller staff, and faster ROI.

Example: Create a filter for Latest Month.

You can add that filter to any metric, use that filter in any report, add that metric into any other metric (such as Latest Month Highest Performers). Any metric can be added to any report. Reports can even be used as filters within other reports.

It can be used in any platform MicroStrategy offers: Developer, Web, Office, Mobile, Dashboards, Data Discovery… This is the same for metrics, reports, dashboards, etc. Build it once, use it anywhere (no need to create duplicate objects for Web and for Mobile, for instance).

If a change is needed in an object, the change is permutated throughout the system. For instance, if the definition of the Sales metric changes, you change the Sales metric and wherever the metric is used, the change is expressed.

This feature saves a lot of time in development and support because you don’t need to keep re-creating objects (and in re-creating them, introduce possible errors). A very small team can support many more users than any other platform, saving the organization money in the long run. In my opinion and experience, this gives MicroStrategy the edge over any other BI system.

Truly provides a single version of the truth. Once you create a metric or report that is correct, it is always correct, no matter where it is deployed. When a company I used to work for first rolled out MicroStrategy, there was a lot of suspicion by the existing DBAs and the traditional SQL report developers about the system’s results. If a report would show incorrect results one month, there was a lot of finger-pointing at MicroStrategy and ‘AHA!’s. In every case, the MicroStrategy team was able to prove that the error was due to incorrect data in the database.

Over time, the MicroStrategy system grew to be the ‘system of record’ and used to validate data loads for other systems.

Documentation and training: Though the basics of the platform are well documented and the in-house training offerings are the best software training classes I have ever attended, MicroStrategy falls a little short when it comes to some of the lesser-known/used features. For most, this will not cause a problem. But if your situation calls for the need to work with System Manager (a workflow application), for example, you'll be stuck searching thru Google and YouTube looking for information.

I have used it since version 5 (1998); 18 years off and on.

I occasionally encountered stability issues. If the metadata becomes extremely large, I have seen instances in which there are internal inconsistency errors. By this, I mean that it’s not that the system suddenly returns incorrect data but rather the internal definition of an object (could be any object: metric, filter, fact, report, hierarchy, etc.) becomes ‘corrupt’. MicroStrategy provides an easy-to-use tool, ScanMD, that finds and fixes these issues should they occur.

The inconsistency is due to the way the MicroStrategy metadata is structured. It is a relational database with many tables. These tables have foreign keys to the other metadata tables. For example, an Object table and a Where Used table. Sometimes the deletion of an object or an update in an object might not be cleanly expressed throughout the metadata database and the relational integrity is broken for that object, throwing an error message when the object is used.

I have not encountered any scalability issues.

Like any technical support group, it depends on which individual you are working with. Some have been stellar. Others make you wonder if they’ve ever really worked with the software beyond basic training. Overall, they are better than most I’ve dealt with.

I did not previously use a different solution.

Set up can be complex, though not as complex as SAP, for example. The most important thing, the very most critical thing, is that the data model is correct. Attributes need to be clearly understood and their relationships to each other and the various facts needs to be carefully defined BEFORE you begin. An ER diagram, be it in Visio or a tool like ERwin, is invaluable and in my personal opinion a must have. Going back to redefine attribute relationships and table structures can be very difficult. Do not think you can ‘figure it out as we build’. You’ll need a person who is an experienced data modeler on the team.

Software installation and hardware configuration is fairly straight forward.

MicroStrategy can be very expensive compared to other platforms – at first blush. The cost of purchasing the software and licenses has frequently been identified in numerous surveys as the factor most often cited for not going the MicroStrategy. The initial buy-in can be expensive; however, the platform is so much cheaper to run over the long haul than most other enterprise systems. A very small dedicated team of developers and quick development times (after initial setup) result in a much-lower yearly platform cost than other systems.

From a licensing viewpoint, there are basically two ways to go: per CPU or per user.
Per CPU: If you will have more than a few hundred users on your system or foresee a very dynamic user base where the number of system users can grow rapidly then shrink then grow again – use per CPU. You can have virtually unlimited users.

Per user: If you have a well-defined user base that you anticipate to stay roughly the same or grow slowly over time this may be your best option. Also, if you anticipate a very high workload (many thousands of reports run per day), this option allows you to add hardware without incurring licensing costs.

FYI It is easier to renegotiate your licensing with MicroStrategy if you go from per user to per CPU than to go the other way around.

I do not know if/what other products were evaluated prior to MicroStrategy.

• Do not attempt to ‘learn as you go’. It is a powerful platform and thus complex to understand. Attend MicroStrategy training classes. MicroStrategy offers on-line and in-house options, but take the classes at a MicroStrategy-sponsored training center; you need to be fully immersed. Those who’ve attempted ‘learn as we build’ are never satisfied.
• Your team needs to have at least one person who is an experienced data modeler and that person needs to take MicroStrategy Architect training and should become MicroStrategy certified in that.
• Your team should have a medium proficiency in SQL. They don’t need to be SQL wizards but they should have a solid base.
• Your initial developers will need to be dedicated MicroStrategy resources. Do not expect them to be supporting and developing a variety of other software/platform initiatives.
• Have a very good working relationship with your DBA staff. Communication is key.
• Document, document, document. Documentation is not for you and your staff – it’s for the poor developers that come in afterwards. Have an ER diagram available for all your source databases. Have flow diagrams showing data loads, schedules, events, outputs. Maintain your system server diagrams (including ODBC connections, etc.). Besides helping new staff with on-boarding, it will help analyze impacts of system changes and is a virtual requirement when doing upgrades.
• In your project plan, expect to utilize at least 25% of the timeline in building the data model (if one does not already exist).

MicroStrategy's biggest advantage is its metadata. It is the building block of the tool, which holds the foundation of the business. Not many of its competitors have this feature in their tools. Metadata will help in scalability, organizing objects and also help enhance their dashboard and report performance.

The learning curve is comparatively small and, finally, they really improved their visualizations in Visual Insights.

Data Visualization helps the company's C-level people to make decisions regarding their business, both small scale and large scale.

They could improve the Enterprise Manager and Operations Manager components. Enterprise Manager is another component that comes MicroStrategy that acts another project inside it. Though it is a great feature, it needs lot of polishing of the objects such as attributes, metrics and others. They could also improve the pre-built reports that they provide with the component.

I have used it since 2010.

As long as the initial setup is done properly, there is nothing to worry in the long run. Users have to make sure they keep the product updated with patches.

I have not encountered any scalability issues; one of the best things about the product is its scalability.

Technical support is 3/5. Elite group customers get the best technical support vs regular customers, whose tickets get delayed.

I did not previously use a different solution; this was my first business intelligence tool.

Initial setup used to be very time consuming and complex (because of so many components) but over the years, they have trimmed it down to minutes.

It’s a great tool and expensive, as well. That’s why small businesses will find it difficult to afford.

Before choosing this product, we evaluated SAP Business Objects, Tableau, IBM Cognos, and QlikView.

You need a strong and well-experienced team to successfully implement and use the tool at its best.

Caching and report bursting, as it offers the phenomenal ways to access the info at a blazing speed.

With this, we have been able to provide consistent reporting with ease, after the efforts put in the initial schema setup.

Visual Insight, as I see, has improved a lot but it still lacks the analytics capability of other tools such as Tableau.

I have used it for seven years.

I have not largely encountered any stability issues, but upgrades at times have been little shaky.

I have not encountered any scalability issues.

Technical support is decently good.

I previously used SAP BO, but it was moving here and there between companies and becoming a bit too much to handle.

We use the Cloud edition, so N/A.

Pricing is bit less transparent and high.

It takes a while to set up properly to reap the benefits fully, so don’t rush up.

• Business users can create their reports once architected
• Available on all devices
• Customization options available at coding and visual levels

Enterprise-wise solutioning helps us to troubleshoot more effectively.

Creating a dashboard is a very tedious and manual process.

I have used it for six years.

I have not encountered any stability issues; it is very stable.

I have not encountered any scalability issues.

Technical support is 6/10.

I did not previously use a different solution.

Initial setup was straightforward.

It is somewhat expensive.

Before choosing this product, we evaluated SAP BusinessObjects and IBM Cognos.

Depending on the data volume, choosing the most suitable database will be key. Setting up the MicroStrategysystem for optimum performance will drive how helpful the output will be.