Astrato Analytics vs. SAS Visual Analytics

Astrato Analytics provides a feature-rich application that it easy to use for the non-technical user yet robust enough to create a sophisticated SaaS application. Astrato Analytics provides native integration to all the major large cloud data platforms and the implementation is very straight forward. The value provided through their feature-rich platform and competitive pricing is unmatched.

I was in a meeting with the client and there I have to show them some analytic data to them. But I was confused about how I will manage to show big data to clients with accuracy. But then the SAS Visual Analytics software helps me in presenting accurate data at the moment and it was very presentable and through that, I got the deal for that business.

Incentivized

• Writeback to the database is simple and straightforward and allows us to build apps in the tool with a level of interation that is not possible with other BI tools
• Version control that is built into the workbooks allows us to quickly deploy changes without the fear of losing the older version and maintianing both a historcal updates and the ability to rollback
• Easy connectivity to a wide range of data platforms including Snowflake, Databricks, and Google Workspace within the same tenant allows us to leverage data from each of these platforms for specific use cases

• Provides the flexibility to the end user to slice and dice the data.
• Anyone can make predictive models with the help of in-built algorithms without the need to write a single line of code or knowledge of what's under the hood of algorithms.
• The feature to simply ask a question related to data and getting a response in form of text, chart or graph is amazing.

Incentivized

• The product is still young, as a consequence, some features aren't as mature as competitors. Astrato has worked to catch up quickly, by rolling out new features regularly
• Better ability to control icons and themes from a central point, instead of having to add/change them on each report

Incentivized

• SAS is relatively expensive when compared to other BI tools and requires a large amount of upfront fee which becomes an issue for smaller organizations.
• UI for the dashboards looks a little date in comparison to competitors like Tableau and Microstrategy.
• Integration with other open source software like Python needs to be built in.

Incentivized

SAS really is the cutting edge in Business Intelligence. That is all they do! They are constantly coming out with new products, product upgrades, and their tech support is second to none. In addition, their support of Education has made our ability to acquire their product possible.

It is a very intuitive system, a pleasure to use, practical and simple, for medium to advanced activities. BI supervisors are delighted with much of the functionality, but highlight some weaknesses that they still have, such as the loading speed in HEIC-type files.

Without a doubt, it is a tool that has become essential in our business routine.

Incentivized

SAS BI is good for creating reports and dashboards and then sharing it with the users. It also has ability to manage access to the reports and dashboards but somehow with most of the world moving to open source languages R, Python and Julia, SAS BI feels to be archaic in terms of feature set and integrations it allow[s]. Also, comparing it with other Business Intelligence tools like Tableau and Microsoft BI, the functionality of SAS BI is very limited and doesn't justify the pricing.

Incentivized

Very friendly, with online help, blog and community. The template documentation could be more complete, however.

Incentivized

When you call tech support, you are immediately routed to a person who can answer your question. Often they can answer on the spot. However, if they cannot, you are given a track number and then followed up with. There have been times when I have had multiple track numbers open and they will actually TRACK YOU DOWN to ensure that your problem has been resolved. Issues do not fall into black holes with SAS. They are also willing to do a WebEx with you to diagnose the problem by seeing your environment, which is always helpful.

To scale PowerBi, we would have needed a staff of technical folks and a substantial budget, and we still probably could not have created the robust SaaS application we did with Astrato Analytics. Astrato Analytics allowed for a staff of two to create and rollout a SaaS Application in under 60 days and provided hands on support to us as needed. There really is no comparison.

I have used Crystal Reports, Jaspersoft and SQL Server Reporting Services (SSRS). I would recommended Business Intelligence over SSRS and Crystal Reports. SSRS is very SQL-centric and Crystal Reports is more of an end-user tool. I would recommend Jaspersoft over Business Intelligence for developing a seamless web-based reporting interface but I highly recommend Business Intelligence for end-user ad-hoc reporting.

Incentivized

• The ability to unify multiple platforms in Astrato provides cost savings.

• SAS Visual Analytics licensing cost should be reduced to enable users to use it in mass scale.
• More statistical and mathematical equations and theories should be converted into SAS functions for reusing.
• Because of enriched ETL and reporting capabilities SAS Visual Analytics is most preferred by business users.

Incentivized