Appian vs IBM BPM | TrustRadius

What users are saying about

Score 7.8 out of 10

Based on 160 reviews and ratings

Score 8 out of 10

Based on 59 reviews and ratings

Feature Rating Comparison

Appian

IBM BPM

Visual Modeling

Drag-and-drop Interfaces

Platform Security

Platform User Management

Reusability

Platform Scalability

Appian

IBM BPM

Dashboards

Standard reports

Custom reports

Appian

IBM BPM

Process designer

Process simulation

Business rules engine

SOA support

Process player

Support for modeling languages

Form builder

Model execution

Appian

IBM BPM

Social collaboration tools

Appian

IBM BPM

Content management

Pros

I have observed after version 17.1 we have a lot of good features in Appian that improve usability (UX). This adds real value in this competitive Digital space.
You can understand business use case and convert it to a logical process automation.
Process Modeller has improved a lot and providing smart services use adds more value.
Service integration helps us to seamlessly integrate with third-party systems

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Ravi Joshi, PMI-ACP®

Solutions Architect

Fidelity InternationalInvestment Management, 5001-10,000 employees

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System does a great job normalizing business process and automating order processing tasks. Before TeamWorks, the process was much more manual and more expensive staff ($65k to $70K) were required to manage the process. Since implementing TeamWorks, we need much lower-skilled workers to manage order processing.
System ensures that we have consistent data across all systems.
Rules engine is really the “company playbook” – it is the heart and soul of how the company works. It handles thousands of orders per day

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Verified User

Vice-President in Information Technology

Computer Software Company, 51-200 employees

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Cons

Appian is continually improving the product but having to learn new features every 3 months (upgrade schedule) can be a challenge.
Graphical user interface could use some additional improvements but it has come a long way already.
Sites could use some additional modifications. Currently, the News Feed is not available on a site.

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Business Process Management Administrator/Designer

Scripps Networks InteractiveBroadcast Media, 1001-5000 employees

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Performance - due to high I/O with DB some of the times the flow responds slowly to changes.
Supporting coarse-grained services. Some of the services with nested objects and cyclical references do not generate the types on the BPM side.
Support a higher number of in flight instances - the system chokes and behaves erratically once the active instances goes above 20K.

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Keshava Murthy B S

IBM Smarter Process Solution Architect

PerficientComputer Software, 1001-5000 employees

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Likelihood to Renew

Appian 9.0

Based on 16 answers

We recently renewed our license with Appian. We are convinced that its flexibility, relative ease of use, the support they provide, there mobile advancements and their general willingness and desire to see us succeed all contributed to our reason to renew our agreement with Appian

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Michael Campbell, PMP,CSM

Director, Strategic Process Project Management

Scripps NetworksBroadcast Media, 1001-5000 employees

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IBM BPM 8.0

Based on 4 answers

This particular decision will be made by other people. Overall IBM BPM is the best BPM engine that I have worked with. It is implemented at our company and IT and business are already somewhat familiar with it. Therefore if asked I will recommend renewal as long as the price is reasonable.

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Verified User

Manager in Information Technology

Music Company, 501-1000 employees

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Usability

Appian 8.1

Based on 32 answers

The interface is as difficult to use as you make it. We like to follow the KISS principle and automate the mundane so that our staff can concentrate on their day job and not have to worry about what happens next.

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Business Analyst

Sydney AirportAirlines/Aviation, 201-500 employees

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IBM BPM 8.0

Based on 2 answers

• The system is easy enough to use but, by definition, is a complex tool. However, they have done a good job generally balancing tool complexity / capability with usability. When comparing to MS Biz Talk, for example, Biz Talk has less functionality but is actually harder to use.
• Software is very flexible. For somebody with the right technical background, it’s quite easy to write some Java code to overcome any hurdles or make the product do what is needed

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Verified User

Vice-President in Information Technology

Computer Software Company, 51-200 employees

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Support

Appian 8.4

Based on 55 answers

We have Appian support here full time who are always helpful and understand both the products and our needs. They help guide the product to help it stay stable.On the odd occasion we need to call Appian themselves, they have always been responsive and genuinely want to help us solve the issue.Recently I've needed to send in quite a few support tickets for various issues, none of them were critical and 2 or 3 of them were just questions. Each time I got a response very quickly and each time the help was what was needed.

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Verified User

Analyst in Information Technology

Financial Services Company, 501-1000 employees

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IBM BPM 9.0

Based on 1 answer

• Always get a response to a support ticket in less than 2 hours
• Urgent tickets are usually responded to within 15 minutes
• Support staff generally are familiar with our setup and it’s not necessary to explain things multiple times – frequently talk to the same person who is very familiar with our setup

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Verified User

Vice-President in Information Technology

Computer Software Company, 51-200 employees

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In-Person Training

Appian 9.0

Based on 1 answer

No answer on this topic is available.

IBM BPM 9.0

Based on 1 answer

• Attended on premise sysadmin training for 4 days, 8 hours per day. Although further follow-up training was available, I never felt the need to go back. Training was very hands-on with real modeling (rather than just following a manual). Very effective.

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Verified User

Vice-President in Information Technology

Computer Software Company, 51-200 employees

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Implementation

Appian 8.2

Based on 3 answers

It was really seamless. SaaS in the true definition of the word. We logged on and started using the product. Very easy.

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Development Team Lead for BPM, Integration and Special Project Teams

University of WollongongHigher Education, 1001-5000 employees

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IBM BPM 9.0

Based on 1 answer

• Very satisfied – not too difficult at all.
• We had a consultant available as part of our contract, but we didn’t really need to use (except for some advice on ActiveDirectory and single sign-on)

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Verified User

Vice-President in Information Technology

Computer Software Company, 51-200 employees

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Alternatives Considered

The main advantage of Appian is the cost structure that is more suitable for starting a test-project to see how develop in Appian and most of all how Appian is accepted inside the company. In few weeks you can show the first results and start the journey on digitalization.

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Verified User

Project Manager in Other

Banking Company, 201-500 employees

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Pega Pega is a comprehensive suite which offers a unique theme of BPM development in the market. A no-coding approach based on rules with inheritance makes Pega a very powerful product. However Pega, falls short on integration centric capabilities and very rigid to customize. On the other hand IBM comes with array of products which suits needs of varying degree. Advanced integration is solved by BPEL Process Server which has support for state based patterns and mediation. Dynamic rules and event management can be solved with WODM, Cloud to on-premise connectivity with Cast Iron, Enterprise gateway and security usecases with DataPower, Social BPM with IBM BPM , WODM, mobify with Worklight.Pega has a little bit of eveything here and there. It solves the dynamic rule management, brings out the flavor of Social BPM and mobility with Antenna ( I guess) and predictive analytics as well in one single suite. There are certain usecases which needs to have a little bit of everything, however this little bits and pieces of functionality when its blows, Pega would have problems to scale. With IBM its a bit nightmare to maintain a variety of technologies, however you can wish to go for one without the other and go for something only when you truly need it.Pega vs IBMIts difficult to pick a winner. In nutshell when you want a full scale BPM with rich integration capabilities go for IBM BPM. On the other hand if you hava mature integration capability already, Pega can yield quick results for you as well. Pega's strength is its methodology. IBM BPM's strength is integration. Actually you can't go wrong with both in terms of implementation. My strong recommendation is to invest time to process analysis and pick a good vendor to support consulting and implementation.

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Prasanna Selvaraj

Senior Consultant

Mindtree Ltd.Information Technology and Services, 10,001+ employees

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Scalability

No score

No answers yet

No answers on this topic

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IBM BPM 10.0

Based on 1 answer

It scales from small team interactions to business processes serving thousands of employees, as well as straight-through-processing needs that go well beyond. Of course, scale is always in the eye of the beholder, but IBM BPM does a good job of giving you all of the hooks, APIs, and data that you need to take on whatever scaling approaches you need to meet the load

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Founder and Chief Technology Officer

BP3 Global, Inc.Information Technology and Services, 11-50 employees

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Return on Investment

Our objective to reduce customer effort when dealing with government by 25% was exceeded. In the process of applying for an alcohol licence renewal alone, we saw approximately 80% reduction in time and effort for the business customer - and that was just a prototype! Imagine the possibilities when this is taken into a live environment!

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Lynley Johnston

Contract Senior Business Analyst

Department of Internal Affairs (NZ)Government Administration, 1001-5000 employees

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In the case of retail origination, the back office required for processing was reduced by 50%. The cases sent to credit assessment were also reduced by 50%. The quality at the origin was improved by 10%.
By having detailed tracking for each request, the audit reports stopped being unfavorable.
It is a fundamental pillar in our digital growth, allowing us to align our processes to our business needs.

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Lider de proyectos

Banco GaliciaBanking, 5001-10,000 employees

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Screenshots

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Pricing Details

General

Free Trial

Yes

Free/Freemium Version

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Premium Consulting/Integration Services

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Entry-level set up fee?

No

General

Free Trial

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Free/Freemium Version

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Premium Consulting/Integration Services

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Entry-level set up fee?

No

Rating Summary

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