AlphaSense vs. Backstop

AlphaSense is the best overall Ml/CI solution I've ever used. The tool has far surpassed the capabilities I used in the past (tools like Nexis and Factiva) and offers unique content and better usability. I have found some gaps that require incremental subscriptions to complementary tools (HG Insights, Crunchbase, Crayon, etc.). Still, I believe these capabilities could be added through acquisition or further product development.

Incentivized

Backstop makes planning and selecting the portfolio efficiently. There is a candid assistance in matters of resource utilization. Moreso, Backstop has a cost accounting notion, which makes the company control the expenses they make. Finally, Backstop has classical research procedures where analysis and decisions arrive after extensive assistance and evaluations.

Incentivized

• Key market trends- I input a topic name and get information related to the topic.
• Competitor filings- Alphasense is able to get all the regulatory documents quickly.
• Earnings calls- Alphasense now provides transcripts, which is incredibly helpful when I can't attend the earnings call live.

Incentivized

• Storage of notes from calls and meetings.
• Tracking portfolio holding balances, transactions, and IRRs/MOICs.
• Allowing flexibility for client-defined uses.

Incentivized

• The whole platform should be much faster with less lag.
• The layout of the document search isn't great. Often, I find it hard to expand sources or dates.
• Financials sections should be customisible, i.e. bolden certain ratios, remove others etc.
• "Error loading documents, please refresh the widget" should be seen fewer times than often.
• Why can't I export events dates to my Outlook calendar?

Incentivized

• Poor communication procedures
• Lack of specific OS support
• No mobile version for Backstop

Incentivized

AlphaSense is a very useful tool and is reasonably priced for our organization. While I may not be a hyper-active user, it's a great resource when I need to quickly do a competitive landscape survey, review publicly available documents (transcripts, etc.), or review Wall Street research

Incentivized

Alphasense is very user-friendly, and the team also does a great job of getting users set up before they are officially left to explore the platform on their own. While I have the added advantage of coming from a background that uses many of the same techniques to search for data, the prompts available and AI incorporated provide the needed direction to identify the information you are looking for without the experience I speak of.

Incentivized

The availability of Alphasense is great. I have used the software for multiple years and cannot remember ever having an outage issue. This is surprising actually, as I use other software applications that do not have regular outages, but still have outages periodically. Alphasense, on the other hand, never seems to have any outages. Good sign if I can't remember the software not working :).

Incentivized

Loading or performing searches on AlphaSense platform is reasonably fast for most of the time. However, it is sometimes unacceptably long for me to load PDF files (earnings presentation, supplementary financial report) on AlphaSense. Certain features might also take very long time, such as loading for "similar tables" across EDGAR filings, or downloading tables from EDGAR filings

Incentivized

Customer support is very prompt. I get personalized support for search recommendations and content that I could not find in my own search. Support checks in with me on a bi-monthly basis to keep me informed of the many different feature additions, I cannot find a more kind, understanding, and supportive team.

Backstop support is fantastic. They always pick up the phone without a wait and are highly knowledgeable, I rarely need more than 5 minutes to fix an issue.

Incentivized

The person was prepared, attentive, understood the nature of my questions, was willing to work through any difficulties or misunderstandings, was patient, and super pleasant to work with. Great customer service.

Incentivized

Trainers address the basics, and such training was meant for new users. Instructions are really helpful by providing scenarios that our team will face in our daily tasks. It will be more thoughtful if the training is conducted by case studies so as to allow new users to get first-hand experience during the training.

Incentivized

use friendly UI made the transition seamless

Incentivized

Nothing else had the platform capabilities nor the level of access to information that AlphaSense does. Everything else I tried had one area or type of information it aggregated, but none of them were able to integrate information the way AlphaSense does, and most of them didn't really enable access to news, so I had to supplement my work with RSS feeds and dozens of open browser tabs. AlphaSense collapsed all of that effort into one search in one window.

Incentivized

I have not used or evaluated any Backstop competitors. Freestone already used Backstop when I started.

Incentivized

flexible billing

Incentivized

The sharing features provides by AlphaSense mean that it can be readily scaled for teams within an organization and, subject to compliance requirements, with client organizations. The ability to share annotations of transcripts and investor releases is valuable, and facilitates collaboration between analysts.

Incentivized

Very professional and knowledgeable team. Easy to work with and communicates in a way that's helpful for users who aren't experts on the platform

Incentivized

• AlphaSense has allowed us to generate deeper competitive insights. For example, we conducted an in depth analysis of the aerial data analytics (drone) industry, and AlphSense helped us narrow in on the market leaders and their various strengths / weaknesses.
• AlphaSense has improved our team's overall efficiency. With Stream in particular, we are able to pinpoint insights in a matter of minutes through the transcript feature as opposed to having to conduct a series of calls ourselves. This is a significant time saver.
• AlphaSense has allowed us to make more informed decisions on our public holdings by providing us with unfettered access to equity research analyst reports.

Incentivized

• Business ends up profiting
• The chances of investing in the wrong projects don't exist
• The analytical assistance from Backstop increases more investment plans

Incentivized