Anaplan vs. SAP Analytics Cloud

Anaplan is a great tool for complex modeling of the future. When you are planning your actions for the future, have multiple, disparate datasets to interact with, have dozens if not hundreds of stakeholders who must contribute and need to be guided via a streamlined workflow engine, require complex logic that can grow with your org, require real-time reporting, and you need it all in less than 6 months.

SAP Analytics Cloud is great for big companies that want advanced data analysis and planning, especially when they need to work together in real-time or when people need to access data on their phones. It's like a super tool for predicting future trends in industries like retail or finance. SAC also works well for companies that use different types of computer systems because it can easily connect them. But, for small businesses that only need basic reports or don't have a lot of technical resources, a simpler tool might be better. If a company doesn't always have a good internet connection or if they're just starting with analytics, there might be other tools that work better.

Incentivized

• Anaplan can scale as your business grows, for example adding new regions into to your geographical hierarchy.
• Anaplan is flexible and can do anything you want it to, there are no tables pre-configured that you need to fix your business process into.
• Reading formulas in Anaplan is straight forward with a quick learning curve.

• It makes it easier yo analyse order and related records easily.
• We can easily maintain and track the performance of employees in organisation.
• Can easily track various aspects for the growth of an organisation thus allowing real time analysis and tracking of organisation's growth and performance.

Incentivized

• Ability to decide if to apply the formula or a manual input on front end for each line item
• Real Time Data Transfer across models. Currently Data is transferred using Processes across different models. Having a functionality to access data from any model in real time would be great

• Complexity in Data Modeling
• SAC supports various data sources, but improvements in the ease of connecting to and integrating with certain data repositories, especially non-SAP databases, would enhance the platform's versatility and integration capabilities.
• An offline mode for SAC could be valuable for users who need to access and analyze data without an internet connection. Additionally, optimizing performance for large datasets and complex visualizations would contribute to a smoother user experience.

Incentivized

Anaplan is a very strong multi-dimensional modeling tool that provides a calculation engine to empower a complex planning process. It is fairly easy to learn for those with experience in similar tools, or excel. It forces structure and auditability that spread sheets do not have, along with extensive security capabilities

There’s no doubt I will renew SAP Analytics Cloud. It is the most vital tool in our organization that makes it seamless to make rapid business decisions by collecting, modeling and visualizing data in real-time.

Anaplan's usability is very good. Users can customize reports and make adjustments with very little training. They can quickly plan and collaborate very easily. Making large adjustments or creating complex functionality may require more experience or training but a lot of tasks can be completed by users with very little experience

Considering the feedback and improvements made over time, users often rate SAP Analytics Cloud's usability in the range of 7 to 9 out of 10. Positive aspects include its integration capabilities, collaborative features, and the ability to create visually appealing dashboards. Some users, however, may note a learning curve or desire additional customization options.

Incentivized

There are very few outages. Maintenance is scheduled on two or three Saturdays per month, so as not to affect businesses. When there is an outage, users are kept informed of progress to restore the platform and typically this takes no more than an hour. Anaplan customer support is very responsive if we ever have questions about platform issues

I would rate SAP Analytics Cloud an 8 out of 10 for scalability. It offers a flexible, cloud-based architecture that supports expansion across departments and geographies. The platform adapts well to growing data volumes and user needs, making it a strong choice for organizations looking to scale analytics capabilities efficiently.

Incentivized

Everything is calculated in memory in the cloud. It's nearly instantaneous updates when you make changes. The only time things get a little slow is when you have a massive model with very intricate calculations...but "slow" for Anaplan is not what I would call "slow" for something like Hyperion. We used to have Hyperion calcs that ran for 60 mins before you could use data. The equivalent would be 60 seconds in Anaplan.

Incentivized

I would rate SAP Analytics Cloud’s performance an 8 out of 10. Pages generally load quickly, and reports run within a reasonable time frame, even with complex datasets. Integration with other systems is smooth and doesn’t noticeably affect performance. Overall, it’s a responsive and efficient tool for business analytics. But

Incentivized

Support quality has dropped since Thoma Bravo has taken over. I think some serious re-focus needs to happen here -- part of the beauty of being in the Anaplan community was how involved you felt in it before. Before I didn't dread sending a support ticket, now I am starting to.

Since the implementation stage, the support team has been very helpful and assisting. Even in the later stages, the tech team had quite a rapid response. In general, SAP has provided us with great customer support, let it be for a specific product of SAP or for integration of different modules.

Incentivized

In my opinion, in-person training is always the best if you have the option to do so. This allows real-time interactions with the instructions, whereas the online training I took required me to write-down questions, email them, and wait for responses. This slows down the process, as you can imagine. That said, in-person training is an extra cost and it likely isn't needed for everyone. I would suggest selecting a small number of people to take in-person training and then having them act as mentors to the rest of your team. That way, as the rest of the team takes the online training, they have a resource to help them in real time.

Good videos and reference material available in SAP Portal.

Incentivized

Anaplan training materials are clear, simple, easy to understand and to follow. Visuals are excellent. The vendor is good at updating training materials in a timely manner and encouraging users and administrators to keep coming back to Academy site for refresher courses or new feature courses. I really like their interactive diagrams

it's ok

Incentivized

Agile methodology and breaking the work down into sprints was very helpful. Implementation required a deeper dive into our data than expected for the consultants to be able to construct the data model. But once it was in place, the focus on knowledge transfer enabled us to be able to use the product effectively after the team rolled off.

Incentivized

SAC is a simple solution ad it works fine when connecting it to other SAP tools. On the other hand, connecting it to third party solutions brings difficulties when there's no previous design and the objetives are not clear. It is really important to integrate Business users from the start to provide with valuable business insights

Incentivized

Compared to OneStream and Venna Anaplan offers a more modern look and feel of the platform. It is better situated and maintained in regards of platform updates as it's a full SaaS software there are never any issues with the system version as it's always automatically up to date with no backward compatibility issues. Due to the flexible nature of the modelling engine, it is also better suited to perform larger multi-department use cases, like IBP (Integrated Business Planning)

SAP is a product/solution that contains extra capabilities that might be considered an enhancement; SAP Analytics Cloud models are based on a huge data collection, and numerous models can be integrated. When coupled with different SAP systems, Analytics Cloud has a common dataset architecture; this software also includes improved analytics capabilities.

Incentivized

unit pricing

Incentivized

We have managed to leverage Anaplan for financial planning and forecasting across the business. It is now used by almost every department, with more than 50 users (but I know of companies that have hundreds of users) and still the platform is quick and reliable. It is easy to make changes to divisions and departments or add users and apply different user settings - the core part of the model is not affected and end users can continue their work without any disruption

I would rate SAP Analytics Cloud an 8 out of 10 for scalability. It offers a flexible, cloud-based architecture that supports expansion across departments and geographies. The platform adapts well to growing data volumes and user needs, making it a strong choice for organizations looking to scale analytics capabilities efficiently.

Incentivized

very simple

Incentivized

• We've typically seen an average of 40% removal of time from processes using Anaplan an enabler
• Though difficult to quantify, we consistently find our processes less error prone than in the past. Essentially, we've removed a previously "hidden cost" of risk due to poor data quality that was buried in our processes.

Incentivized

• In general, SAC is a comprehensive analytics platform that offers a range of capabilities for data visualization, reporting, planning, and predictive analytics. It is particularly well-suited for businesses that use SAP systems and are looking to gain insight into their data in a single, integrated platform.

Incentivized