BMC Helix ITSM replaces Remedy. It is a broad suite of ITSM, tools with strong integrations to other BMC tools and in-built ITAM. The product is used mainly by global brands and is offered in on-premise and SaaS configurations.
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Spoke
Score 8.7 out of 10
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Spoke, headquartered in San Francisco, offers their ticketing and request management app designed to support IT help desks, HR, or management with handling employee requests and assistance needs.
Large complex organisation, with complex technology that needs to manage Technology Services. It is very flexible and able to manage a large complex environment but the knowledge required to set this up correctly (foundation data and configuration) is the key factor for success. It can integrate with many other systems and tools and integrate data from many sources - whether that be AWS cloud, or an on premises bespoke system. I would not recommend for a Small Organisation without the resources to set up and maintain the underlying foundation data and configuration.
Spoke is well suited to ingesting the myriad questions and requests I get throughout my workday. If I receive requests directly, they make it easy to change those requests into tickets, which helps my team track and demonstrate the work that we do. Spoke is also great for auto-answering common issues and questions. It only takes three of the same general question for it to start recognizing and offering the answer from our KB. Spoke has also been a great partner in helping our team be more efficient and more effective, something we never got with our old provider. I can’t emphasize enough that Spoke is NOT for external-facing helpdesks. It’s just not. It works best for teams that are supporting their own colleagues. I would also say that, at the moment, it doesn’t scale well past a few hundred users. They’re implementing features this year that will be more helpful for that sort of thing. But it does work great for remote support!
Integration with monitoring software like SolarWinds. where Remedy can transform notifications to work orders and assign to respective teams.
Detailed Customization capability to fit the exact needs of the organization.
Change management calendar, which integrates change orders from all organization departments and facilitates the scheduling process of project managers.
It can be offered as a cloud-based service, where you don't need to worry about server maintenance or database backup.
The interface (ironically). My company has made an attempt to replace the "classic" Remedy interface with some more functional, modern, but Remedy set to a particular look and feel (and consequently, functionality)
The API is hidden from the user: There exists an API for Remedy, that would make my job TONS easier, as I like to perform actions on Remedy in bulk (and therefore - programmatically). Exposing a user API is very much mainstream these days, so Remedy relying on its interface to perform ITIL is very limiting
By extension- the result of Remedy's interface is that it becomes very "click-happy": little buttons, and links stuffed into every corner of the screen, with options API logically together. API is old, but it still feels very rushed.
The primary tool for most of my ITIL operations is: searching. API of searching goes into finding assets, checking in equipment, finding users, tickets, etc. What Remedy could very much benefit from a "Google" -like interface
At least Remedy is all contained in a single platform, so the interface is consistent. Also, the most heavily performed functions are generally usable. However, to use some of the more advanced modules can be a bit more cumbersome (such as Change Management and CMDB (Not Including ADDM)). So, overall BMC Remedy ITSM is better than some applications like CA SDM or HP SM, but not quite on par with ServiceNow.
The support is good in overall resolving the issues and even in the deployment phase. We are able to use it in production without any trained in-house engineer as the support team gets the job done. We can say that experts completed the deployment for us, and now it is functional.
Any questions we've had were fielded in a very timely manner and their staff have been very helpful in our launch and ongoing inquiries. Internally, it has been very well received amongst staff and has increased efficiency, company wide
The decision to select BMC Remedy was made prior to my employment. We did conduct an RFC process for a new ITSM platform and BMC was considered but not selected. We looked at several platforms and ended up choosing Ivanti Service Desk (previously LANDESK) due to the features, ease of customization and price.
Spoke is just... easier. Easier to set up and easier to use, for both admins and users. We already have asset management and didn’t necessarily need our ticketing system to be directly connected to it. We wanted a product that was friendly to use, not crazy expensive, and didn’t require us to purchase an implementation package and/or a multi-day training package to roll-out. It’s not rocket science!
When I was in Management discussion calls, and all the team is happy while using BMC Remedy so I don't find any specific negative impact on our organization.
I really enjoy Smart IT as the tool of choice for our incident management team.
Visibility of tickets is key. All support staff users can see tickets in consoles they have access to.
