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ARIS BPA vs SAP PowerDesigner comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive Summary

Review summaries and opinions

We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use. Here are some excerpts of what they said:
 

Categories and Ranking

ARIS BPA
Average Rating
8.2
Reviews Sentiment
6.8
Number of Reviews
66
Ranking in other categories
Business Process Design (4th), Business Process Management (BPM) (8th)
SAP PowerDesigner
Average Rating
7.8
Reviews Sentiment
6.7
Number of Reviews
35
Ranking in other categories
Enterprise Architecture Management (5th), Metadata Management (4th)
 

Mindshare comparison

ARIS BPA and SAP PowerDesigner aren’t in the same category and serve different purposes. ARIS BPA is designed for Business Process Design and holds a mindshare of 8.1%, down 9.3% compared to last year.
SAP PowerDesigner, on the other hand, focuses on Enterprise Architecture Management, holds 8.9% mindshare, up 8.1% since last year.
Business Process Design
Enterprise Architecture Management
 

Featured Reviews

Veronika Ellermann - PeerSpot reviewer
Very user-friendly application; ARIS has an active user community; Content-sharing in the tool to be improved
The Risk and Compliance Management tool is rather complex. So, we customized it. Customization was done by SAG and was done fast. The facility for sharing content should be enhanced. For example, it would be nice if you could share content with viewers who do not explicitly have access to the model. As it is now, if you share a process with somebody that does not have access to the model, then the person receives a link that simply tells them they have no access. Particularly, when you're in the process of modeling something and you want to share it because you want to get feedback from your colleagues, I would appreciate being able to share that content. It could be valid for a period, such as 24 hours or one week. This is something that would help.
JorgeSanz - PeerSpot reviewer
Effective in terms of validating everything, but sometimes they don't allow us some flexibility and GUI could improve
I would recommend SAP PowerDesigner to others for data architecture management. It provides all the functionalities in terms of data modeling, so it's also a good tool for that. I see trends in terms of data classification, but I don't see this tool with the intelligence to do that automatically. So, like, with artificial intelligence. Overall, I would rate the solution a six out of ten because there are too many validations. Also, I found some gaps in terms of relationships; they didn't appear when you do reverse engineering. Also, this tool lacks artificial intelligence that should be very good in terms of automatically identifying the classification of elements and maybe also to incorporate some artificial intelligence in providing descriptions for each data element included in the solution.

Quotes from Members

We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use. Here are some excerpts of what they said:
 

Pros

"The ability to sort via multiple criteria to identify the relationships you need for a specific object."
"Object oriented modeling allows us to trace what's going on with the specified object."
"The most valuable feature is the process documentation. For us, ARIS is a lifestyle more than a tool. It helps us learn how to think and how to plan for our system."
"ARIS BPA has a good directory option, which helps to keep track of all of your metadata, and that's very useful."
"The initial setup and installation are very straightforward."
"BPA, the modeling tool, is the main module used because of our need for documentation."
"From an architectural point of view, when you're looking at the business area, you can find all the information you have to use as an architect."
"Objects can be reused across different BPMNs and processes, so we can design new processes quicker and easier.​"
"In terms of operational efficiency and cause savings or return on investment, I can say that with SAP PowerDesigner, our company saves a lot of time."
"It has helped me to develop the as-is state, design its to-be state, and track the capital investment according to gap analysis."
"SAP PowerDesigner is fairly stable."
"It can automate many routine tasks and save human resources to focus on real problems."
"SAP PowerDesigner is an excellent tool that does what I need it to do. What I like most about it is that it's stable, fast, and easy to understand."
"It's a great tool for documentation."
"Provides the flexibility to create logical and conceptual data models."
"Has a specific template that's very helpful for importing metadata."
 

Cons

"The user experience's usability (in general) should be improved as the tool is updated."
"The user interface could be more intuitive and better designed."
"The model graphics can be exported in PDF, but the model is too small to read."
"Integration with third-party tools should be improved (e.g. based on APIs)."
"The workflow approval process could be represented better in the overviews."
"The Risk and Compliance Management tool is rather complex and moreover, it needs to be customized if you want to use it."
"There are some things in the collaboration module that could be improved a little, such as the functionality which dynamically pushes notifications to interested people when a process changes during the Release Cycle Management workflow."
"I would like the possibility to use real data. In other words, it can use this system to integrate with others that are operating directing with users like clients, employs, and others."
"UI could be improved by enabling simpler navigation."
"The tool lags in the area of customer service."
"It would be helpful if there were glossary, catalog and governance tools. It would help make it a true end-to-end product."
"SAP PowerDesigner could improve by making the repository easier to understand. It is difficult to understand how the repository works because when I used logical models as part of the team, we wanted to use them together and update the older versions of the data model version but it was confusing. The repository needs to be explained."
"One disadvantage of SAP PowerDesigner is that you cannot reverse engineer the ALTER statements, so that's an enhancement or area for improvement I'm looking forward to seeing from the SAP team in the future. That should directly reflect on the physical data models my company builds."
"Checking-in models to the repository, especially when working remotely, is a slow process than can sometimes have problems with models being corrupted."
"There are many areas of this solution that needs to be changed."
"Technical support needs improvement."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"​It is on the higher side."
"Pricing is a bit on the higher side."
"We have a concurrent license system."
"It is well worth the investment in the enterprise."
"ARIS is quite expensive."
"ARIS BPA is too costly from a licensing perspective."
"You will never get a fixed price for this product because they will go in and ask you what kind of environment would you like to set up? How many people will you work with? How big is your organization? Today, they have a fixed price to say, "Okay, just to start the business area, buy two licenses for modeling and eight people that can look into the product." They have this kind of fixed price. It's 50,000 Danish Krone. If you divided that by about six, then you get the pricing in dollars. Still, when you are going out, negotiate and find the right price. You will never get a fixed price: "It costs this and, if you take ten of these, seven of these and eight of these, and then it costs this." No, you negotiate every time."
"The product is inexpensive."
"When you purchase the license for SAP PowerDesigner, you have to buy one year of support. The tool is worth the money."
"The price of the solution is low."
"SAP PowerDesigner is cheaper than eriwin."
"The pricing varies based on functionality and users."
"I bought the software outright and do not pay a licensing fee."
"Regarding costs, SAP PowerDesigner is pricey, as I've heard from my team manager, which is why the company has been thinking of bringing another solution on board."
"The ROI has been 43%."
"PowerDesigner is not the cheapest solution on the market, so make sure that you are using it to its full potential."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
17%
Manufacturing Company
11%
Computer Software Company
11%
Government
10%
Financial Services Firm
24%
Government
13%
Manufacturing Company
9%
Computer Software Company
8%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about ARIS BPA?
The most valuable features of ARIS BPA are its flexibility and reporting.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for ARIS BPA?
Pricing for ARIS BPA is average, not cheap or expensive. It's cost-effective and worth the money we pay.
What needs improvement with ARIS BPA?
Improvement should be made as per customer requirements.
What do you like most about SAP PowerDesigner?
It allows us to have proper documentation in terms of the databases.
What needs improvement with SAP PowerDesigner?
Based on my experience with SAP PowerDesigner, I'd like to see improvements in the DMM feature. Even if I have an ETL tool, I'd like the DMM options to directly connect to ETL tool repositories lik...
 

Also Known As

ARIS, ARIS BPM
Sybase PowerDesigner
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Tesco, Weifu, Airbus, Siemens, Proximus, Alicorp, Sekerbank, Bancor, Philips,Sky, Emirates NBD, Dubai Municipality, Suva, U.S. Army, Australia Post, Westfalen Weser Energie - ARIS serves customers across all industries and of every size worldwide. Companies trust ARIS as the market leader for process excellence with more than 30 years of experience in the market, 10 million users worldwide, from 1 user companies to the Fortune 500.
Medtronic, Cirque du Soleil, Antarc, B&G Manufacturing, EarlySense, eBay, Ferrero, James Austin Company, Lenovo, Sagem, RAK Ceramics, Vodafone
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837,501 professionals have used our research since 2012.