Oracle BICS vs DVCS vs DVD
Both Business Intelligence Cloud Services (BICS) and Data Visualization Cloud Service are used for data visualization, and have similar capabilities. Deciding which is best for your organization can be challenging. Here’s some tips on making the right decision.
Oracle’s business intelligence platform, Oracle Business Intelligence Enterprise Edition (OBIEE) is an on-premise tool able to create reports, dashboards and real time alerts for users. In 2014, Oracle introduced BICS as the cloud based version of OBIEE, but it didn’t have the full functionality of its on-premise counterpart. While BICS is included in the Oracle Analytics Cloud (OAC), DVCS is not. OAC includes Data Visualization Desktop (DVD), though the versions have lagged DVCS in the past. DVD is a stand-alone version of DVCS, and is free for either DVCS or BICS subscribers, and for those who’ve licensed Visual Analyzer in OBIEE.
As part of it’s cloud first strategy, Oracle upgraded BICS by adding “Visual Analyzer” in 2015. With the addition, BICS could now load data from external sources and create data mashups. Visual Analyzer simplified and extended the way users could build dashboards and other visualizations. At this point, BICS had functionality that OBIEE couldn’t match.
Later that year, Oracle released a version of Visual Analyzer for OBIEE 12c, called the Data Visualization add-in, which is version DV V2. The crucial difference between the two, is that Visual Analyzer for OBIEE requires an additional license, but BICS does not.
After announcing it’s new “Oracle Data Visualization” brand, Oracle announced a repricing of DVCS and BICS. DVCS only offers limited data visualization, at $75 per month per named user, with a 5 user minimum. BICS has a more robust set of visualization tools, and has a standard pricing of $150 per month per named user.
Licensing:
- Data Visualization Desktop – Single User Perpetual
- Data Visualization Cloud Service – $75 Monthly Subscription per User, 5 user Minimum
- Business Intelligence Cloud Service – $150 Monthly Subscription per User, 10 user minimum
| Cost | Minimum Users | Per Processor | Notes | |
| Data Visualization Desktop | $1250 user (month?) | 1 | 80 | Free with DVCS or BICS |
| Data Visualization Cloud Service | $75 user/month | 5 | n/a | Free DVD… |
| Business Intelligence Cloud Service | $150 user/month | 10 | n/a | Free DVD… |
Here are the details from the Oracle website: “DVD is packaged at no extra cost with DVCS and BICS, so customers who subscribe to those services receive a matching number of DVD licenses at no extra charge. On premises, customers license Oracle Data Visualisation for $1250 per named user (minimum lowered to 1), and receive both DV for OBI12c and DVD; when OBI12c and DV are licensed by processor, customers get 80 licenses of DVD per processor, again at no extra charge.”
Details:
| ITEMS | BICS | DVCS | CONTENT LINK | |
| About Product | BICS is the complete package of BI capabilities | Oracle DVCS as a subset offering of Oracle BICS | ||
| Features | Dashboard | Yes | No | https://cloud.oracle.com/en_US/data-visualization/datasheets |
| Analyses | Yes | No | https://cloud.oracle.com/en_US/business-intelligence/videos | |
| Catalog | Yes | Yes | ||
| Modeler | Yes | No | ||
| Snapshot | Yes | Yes | ||
| Safe Domians | Yes | Yes | ||
| Application Role Management | Yes | Yes | ||
| Issue SQL | Yes | Yes | ||
| Session & Query cache | Yes | Yes | ||
| Manage datasets | Yes | No | ||
| Manage Map Data | Yes | No | ||
| Default Data Source | Oracle Cloud database | Yes | Yes | From BICS and DVCS cloud |
| Oracle Applications | Yes | Yes | ||
| Scope | Features Scope | Full with all BI capabilities | limited to data visualization only | |
| Support Data syn (Sync third party databases)* | Third party Databases | Yes | Yes | |
| Sql Queries | Yes | Yes | ||
| Rest API | Yes | Yes | ||
| Free Tools** | DVD | Yes | Yes | |
| Visual Analyzer support | Visual Analyzer | Yes | Yes | |
| Product visualization Components | Number of Components | 26 | 26 | From BICS and DVCS cloud |
| File Support | CSV | Yes | Yes | |
| Excel (XLSX) | Yes | Yes | ||
| Pricing | Monthly Subscription Cost | $150.00 / month / named user | $75.00 / month / named user | https://cloud.oracle.com/en_US/business-intelligence/pricing |
| 10 user minimum | 5 user minimum | https://cloud.oracle.com/en_US/data-visualization/pricing |