Market Perspectives

We are happy to share some insights about Actian drawn from our latest Value Index research, which assesses how well vendors’ offerings meet buyers’ requirements.

We recently published three Ventana Research 2023 Data Platforms Value Indexes, which evaluate technology vendors and products that provide individual and combined analytic and operational data platform support. At Ventana Research, we continue to believe that, for most use cases, there is a clear choice between analytic and operational data platforms to best meet your organization’s needs. We developed three technology assessment and buyers’ guides to focus on overall data platform requirements as well as specific analytic data platform and operational data platform use cases.

In all of our Value Indexes, we utilize a structured research methodology built on evaluation categories designed to reflect real-world criteria and derived from RFP responses and a vendor selection process for analytics and business intelligence. For each of the Value Indexes, we evaluated Actian and other vendors in seven categories: five relevant to the product — Adaptability, Capability, Manageability, Reliability and Usability — and two related to the vendor — TCO/ROI and Validation. To arrive at the Value Index rating for a given vendor, we weighted each category to reflect its relative importance in an RFP process, with the weightings based on our experience and on data derived from our market research, including our Benchmark Research on Analytics and Data.

Actian has origins back to the early years of relational database technology and the development of its Ingres transactional database in the late 1970s and early 1980s. Now wholly owned by HCLSoftware, the company’s primary offering is the Actian Avalanche Cloud Data Platform, which enables organizations to ingest, transform, analyze and store data across public cloud, hybrid or on-premises environments.

In the overall Data Platforms Value Index, Actian was categorized as an Innovative Vendor, ranking eighth overall in this Value Index evaluation. It ranked fifth in Product Experience, where it was designated a Value Index Leader in Manageability and Usability. Its overall performance was impacted by its lower ranking in Customer Experience.

Actian could perform better in the area of Validation to demonstrate its commitment to Customer Experience. In TCO/ROI, where it ranked eighth, Actian has the opportunity to utilize its relationship with HCLSoftware to deliver additional services to help customers measure and derive value from their investment.

In the Analytic Data Platforms Value Index, Actian was also categorized as an Innovative Vendor, ranking ninth overall in this Value Index evaluation. It ranked sixth in Product Experience, where it was designated a Value Index Leader in Manageability and Usability. It ranked 14th in Customer Experience.

Actian was also categorized as an Exemplary Vendor in the Operational Data Platforms Value Index, ranking ninth overall in this Value Index evaluation. It ranked fifth in Product Experience, where it was designated a Value Index Leader in the Usability and Manageability categories. It ranked 14th in Customer Experience and ranked best in TCO/ROI.

This assessment was based on Actian’s data platform products generally available as of September 30, 2022.

Organizations should evaluate their data platform requirements for operational and analytic workloads to ensure the existing products and vendors are meeting their needs. If their current data platforms are not satisfying those requirements, they should consider whether Actian can help meet their needs.

This research-based index is the most comprehensive assessment of the value of data platforms in the industry. Technology buyers can learn more about how to use our Value Index by clicking here and included vendors that wish to learn more can click here. Click below to read the individual reports:

Data Platforms Value Index

Analytic Data Platforms Value Index

Operational Data Platforms Value Index