Bubble PPM vs. EPM Live

Bubble PPM is well suited for anyone who manages product related projects, especially new product development. As we've matured in our implementation of the system we found that it is great for managing all projects, but the specific strength is product development to launch. Bubble PPM would not be as appropriate for use as a CRM tool, as the references to people are best suited to users within the organization

I think EPM Live might be the right solution for a much smaller company, who does mainly business to business material sales. As a software company with a ramped subscription model and heavy use of Salesforce, it was not well suited to our business.

• I already mentioned the simple user interface for data upload, and the equally intuitive customized reporting. Leadership and "supporting" functions for product development get tremendous value from this because they don't need to hunt down answers anymore. Everything from pipeline planning to operational planning can be built on the same foundation of objective data, rather than many different sources interpreted through many different lenses.
• But the greatest value I think Bubble Innovator delivers is not really the product itself. It's the sense of partnership and responsiveness from the Bubble Innovation team. The Bubble Innovation team becomes a part of your team. They are valued consultants with helpful input on best practices for stage gate management, portfolio analytics, and report visualization. I have continually been impressed with the responsiveness and effort that their team brings to the table. When we have challenges and need to customize our data or analytics or reporting, they are right there beside us, finding the best solution, sharing prototypes in a test environment, and implementing as fast as possible.

• Fantastic project management features
• Cost and Resource management features more than paid for the software
• Social Collaboration tools improve communication between departments

• Development of custom functionality, and redefining 'standard' options for the software. As Bubble grows and their customer base increases there will be opportunity for this, at present development projects can be slow and expensive. However the standard software options are excellent, but as processes evolve within organisations the flexibility to evolve the software could be made simpler.

• This is a solid product. I do not have any suggested changes based on our experience. Cannot understand why there are any negative reviews here. The reviewer(s) must not have given the product a fair chance.

The business has been extremely satisfied with Bubble Innovator and is in support of rolling this tool out to our other businesses within the overall franchise.

The product is just not fitting our needs so we are looking at other alternatives. The system has gone down 3 times in the last 6 months and was down for at least half a day, timesheets have duplicate tasks, and it takes too long to save and submit. When trying to process updates it randomly changes our dates so we have to go back and fix them, sometimes tasks are lost and the system is just very confusing and hard to manipulate

Incentivized

The user interface is highly visual and simple. Literally within 10-15 minutes of my introduction to the software, I was up and running. Of course, deeper capabilities become apparent after additional use, but the basic functionality is very simple to grasp. Where there are consistent challenges reported by multiple users, the Bubble Innovation team is quick to connect and put plans in place to address the challenges.

Outstanding response times, and solutions to issues requiring support are quickly implemented. For bigger issues or longer term developments, Bubble happily takes the time to meet in person and discuss requirements to drive detailed solutions.

We get support when needed.

Incentivized

The number of variables made this extremely challenging (org changes, stage gate harmonization, pipeline prioritization, and new governance model). I think the implementation was handled very well in spite of this, and managed to deliver on time and on budget.

When evaluating Bubble Innovator against the competition, we felt that Bubble Innovator gave us the flexibility that we were looking for. Other solutions tended to have some hardwired functionality. Bubble Innovator was a great fit for managing our projects and was efficient to deploy, especially within our existing business processes.

EPM was easier to use, with better and simpler UI. The product was also a great combination of price and functionality compared to other tools

Incentivized

• Increased efficiency at several levels - Proejct Teams/Project Managers/Portfolio Decsision Makers
• Driven consistency of process and reporting across a complex global organization
• Greater visibility of NPD pipeline has led to improved cross functional alignment on priorites
• Improved portfolio decision making capability

• We had to pay EPM for a solution that was, for our business, unusable
• We gained much needed experience in working with third party software vendors