Altair Monarch vs. Phocas Business Intelligence

Overview
ProductRatingMost Used ByProduct SummaryStarting Price
Altair Monarch
Score 8.0 out of 10
N/A
Altair Monarch (formerly Datawatch Monarch, acquired by Altair in December, 2018) works with both relational and multi-structured data including support for a wide range of formats including PDF, XML, HTML, text, spool and ASCII files. The product can access data from invoices, sales reports, balance sheets, customer lists, inventory, logs and more. According to the vendor, the system is easy to use, allowing users to quickly select any data source and automatically convert it into…N/A
Phocas Business Intelligence
Score 8.1 out of 10
N/A
Phocas helps users discover data and provides results in real time.  It is designed for non-technical users and delivers a simple yet powerful analytical capability that quickly turns data into a chart, graph or map.  It brings up data on local, regional or global sales, inventory, forecasts, prices, profit margins, budgets and more. Phocas, based in the United Kingdom, is a business intelligence firm with offices in…N/A
Pricing
Altair MonarchPhocas Business Intelligence
Editions & Modules
No answers on this topic
No answers on this topic
Offerings
Pricing Offerings
Altair MonarchPhocas Business Intelligence
Free Trial
YesYes
Free/Freemium Version
YesNo
Premium Consulting/Integration Services
YesYes
Entry-level Setup FeeOptionalNo setup fee
Additional DetailsPhocas has built its business model on exceeding customer expectations. We’ve operated on a subscription basis from the start and in the words of Phocas Group chairman and co-founder Paul Magee: ‘That puts the onus on us to perform’. And we like that. In fact, our whole company ecosystem is built around that ‘light bulb moment’ when customers achieve a breakthrough by seeing their business through fresh eyes.
More Pricing Information
Community Pulse
Altair MonarchPhocas Business Intelligence
Top Pros
Top Cons
Features
Altair MonarchPhocas Business Intelligence
BI Standard Reporting
Comparison of BI Standard Reporting features of Product A and Product B
Altair Monarch
-
Ratings
Phocas Business Intelligence
9.0
4 Ratings
10% above category average
Customizable dashboards00 Ratings9.04 Ratings
Report Formatting Templates00 Ratings9.04 Ratings
Ad-hoc Reporting
Comparison of Ad-hoc Reporting features of Product A and Product B
Altair Monarch
-
Ratings
Phocas Business Intelligence
9.6
4 Ratings
17% above category average
Drill-down analysis00 Ratings10.04 Ratings
Formatting capabilities00 Ratings9.04 Ratings
Report sharing and collaboration00 Ratings10.04 Ratings
Report Output and Scheduling
Comparison of Report Output and Scheduling features of Product A and Product B
Altair Monarch
-
Ratings
Phocas Business Intelligence
9.3
4 Ratings
11% above category average
Publish to PDF00 Ratings10.04 Ratings
Report Versioning00 Ratings8.03 Ratings
Report Delivery Scheduling00 Ratings9.94 Ratings
Data Discovery and Visualization
Comparison of Data Discovery and Visualization features of Product A and Product B
Altair Monarch
-
Ratings
Phocas Business Intelligence
8.3
4 Ratings
3% above category average
Pre-built visualization formats (heatmaps, scatter plots etc.)00 Ratings8.04 Ratings
Location Analytics / Geographic Visualization00 Ratings9.03 Ratings
Predictive Analytics00 Ratings8.04 Ratings
Access Control and Security
Comparison of Access Control and Security features of Product A and Product B
Altair Monarch
-
Ratings
Phocas Business Intelligence
9.9
4 Ratings
15% above category average
Multi-User Support (named login)00 Ratings9.94 Ratings
Role-Based Security Model00 Ratings9.94 Ratings
Multiple Access Permission Levels (Create, Read, Delete)00 Ratings9.93 Ratings
Mobile Capabilities
Comparison of Mobile Capabilities features of Product A and Product B
Altair Monarch
-
Ratings
Phocas Business Intelligence
9.5
3 Ratings
18% above category average
Responsive Design for Web Access00 Ratings9.03 Ratings
Dashboard / Report / Visualization Interactivity on Mobile00 Ratings10.03 Ratings
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User Ratings
Altair MonarchPhocas Business Intelligence
Likelihood to Recommend
8.1
(6 ratings)
8.1
(4 ratings)
Likelihood to Renew
7.2
(6 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
Usability
-
(0 ratings)
9.0
(1 ratings)
Support Rating
-
(0 ratings)
9.0
(1 ratings)
User Testimonials
Altair MonarchPhocas Business Intelligence
Likelihood to Recommend
Altair Engineering, Inc.
The product is especially useful when you have real-time and/or time series data to analyze. If you have more mundane, simpler requirements, other products might do the job you need for less money (there are even some decent open source visualization tools you can find.) I know the product is very widely used in capital markets applications to monitor and analyze risk and price and volume changes; if you're working in that area, I don't think there's a better tool to use.
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Phocas
If you would like your data in one place with easy access, this is the software for you. You can have data from multiple systems and bring it into one view so that you have a quick and easily visible dashboard for the data you wish to see.
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Pros
Altair Engineering, Inc.
  • Creating a basic model to extract data from a report is very easy.
  • Advanced features like Calculated Fields and External Lookups allow you to augment the raw data.
  • You can create a "project" to automate the data extraction. Combined with Datapump (a separate DW app), you can fully automate the process once the raw report is generated.
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Phocas
  • Custom reports are simple to create.
  • The ability to manage users and their dashboards is solid.
  • Easy to navigate web interface makes the software accessible from anywhere.
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Cons
Altair Engineering, Inc.
  • Recently, we had some major sticker-shock when we wanted to upgrade Data Pump. It is an exceptional product, but when the price jumped from $6,000 to over $60,000, it was impossible to get the funds approved internally for the upgrade.
  • We also paid for yearly maintenance contracts which included Professional Services, but rarely found those services beneficial. However, we did receive all software upgrades for Datapump as part of the contract which we found to be very beneficial. However, with the new pricing, that is not longer the case.
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Phocas
  • Phocas needs to make it easier to connect to different types of databases.
  • The data in Phocas needs to be updated faster in some cases.
  • It needs to provide functions to create better charts and graphs.
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Likelihood to Renew
Altair Engineering, Inc.
Even though we do not utilize it on a daily basis, I do hope my current company renews it's license. If not, I intend to purchase myself.
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Phocas
No answers on this topic
Usability
Altair Engineering, Inc.
No answers on this topic
Phocas
It is a very user-friendly product and is easy to understand. You can get your data from just a quick click and the dashboard loads. You can take the data and drill down easy to find what you are looking for.
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Support Rating
Altair Engineering, Inc.
No answers on this topic
Phocas
Support is responsive. You log a call and they will respond quickly and resolve your issues. We have only had great experiences with the support team.
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Alternatives Considered
Altair Engineering, Inc.
Datawatch is very good value of money compared to QlikView; QlikView is really more of a BI tool and has a lot of functions that I didn't need. Datawatch is very strong in the real-time area where Tableau, Panorama, and Qlik don't do very well. If you need to set up a visual monitoring dashboard, Datawatch is the best product I've seen for that. if you want to do a lot of in depth statistical analysis of large databases, Tableau is probably a good option.
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Phocas
Phocas is easy to use for end users and can be used on desktops, laptops, and phones.
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Return on Investment
Altair Engineering, Inc.
  • Data Pump reduces complexity of report solutions by offering a standardized approach for organizing and scheduling
  • 97% service level for past 5 years for all of our jobs going through Data Pump
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Phocas
  • It has given our business a view on data
  • We can access it from anywhere
  • You can have multiple dashboards for different information
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ScreenShots

Altair Monarch Screenshots

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Phocas Business Intelligence Screenshots

Screenshot of Phocas Dashboard on iPadScreenshot of Phocas Dashboard on Laptop