SAS is a company which name is known to many people all over the world, even if they not always know exactly what's the company profile. Originated from North Carolina, SAS is one of the most meaningful companies in software industry, with number of customers reaching tens of thousands. It has done plenty of good in different aspects of providing enterprises with IT service, and now is also delivering data integration products which can easily compete with the ones provided by other leading vendors. In case of data integration, products by SAS-DataFlux are Enterprise Data Integration Server, DataFlux Data Management Platform, DataFlux Federation Server, SAS Data Migration and SAS/Access.

Strengths

• enough functionality in most meaningful data integration market segments
• broad capabilities for ETL, data federation, CDC, and real-time data flow
• integration with data quality functionality
• large customer base in different countries
• solid brand image
• alignment with current market trends
• good perspectives

SAS-DataFlux data integration products are praised commonly for their undoubted functionality, which is consistent with the most active market segments. For most of typical uses, SAS-DataFLux system is therefore one of the first choices made by customers from all over the world, where the company is present. Beside data integration itself, it also is praised for its ETL, data federation, CDC, and real-time data flow capabilities. Another good aspect of it is correlation between data integration and data quality functionalities.

SAS is one of the best known companies of software industry, therefore its presence in almost every country of the world isn't anything surprising. Instead of surprise, it guarantees a solid base for building relations with customers who are automatically provided with a certainty of working with a loyal and experienced vendor. What it results in is brand image without any scratch on it. Understanding market trends is another advantage of SAS-DataFlux. It guarantees that software is developed and expanded appropriately with the newest tendencies, what is what some competing companies truly miss. Thereupon, the customers of SAS-DataFLux know that they can purchase a solution which they will be able to use efficiently for many years without a need for searching for any better replacement. Stability and loyalty is what today's customers, in the age of constantly-changing market conditions, look for from the very first moment.

Weaknesses

• analytics roots-dependent deployments
• limited diversity in use cases
• product licensing
• high prices
• strategy changes

What SAS has originated from is analytics and this is also what's reflected in almost all SAS' future products. Data integration solutions aren't any different in this case. Data integration capabilities are therefore influenced with analytics uses, and business intelligence is the thing which SAS-DataFlux data integration solutions are most often chosen for, while other cases are rather a rarity. Simultaneously, other vendors seem to be more universal.

What else shouldn't happen to such a famous provider like SAS-DataFlux, are difficulties with product licensing. Customers generally complain on complicated licensing options as well as on high prices which make SAS-DataFlux data integration products not as competitive as they should be. Total cost of ownership is also high and - for some customers - high enough to keep them away from these products. Maybe it could change in the nearest future, because the customers point out recent absorption of DataFlux into SAS sales organization as a reason of the aforementioned issues. What's disputable is if SAS is going to increase attention paid to data integration or not. That's important to customers who would think of joining the customer family of SAS-DataFlux.