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AutoSys Workload Automation vs Control-M comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Mar 9, 2025

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

AutoSys Workload Automation
Ranking in Workload Automation
7th
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
7.2
Number of Reviews
81
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
Control-M
Ranking in Workload Automation
1st
Average Rating
8.8
Reviews Sentiment
7.0
Number of Reviews
120
Ranking in other categories
Process Automation (3rd), Managed File Transfer (MFT) (4th)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of April 2025, in the Workload Automation category, the mindshare of AutoSys Workload Automation is 12.8%, down from 18.5% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Control-M is 23.1%, down from 26.1% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Workload Automation
 

Featured Reviews

Antony Askew - PeerSpot reviewer
Helps us manage complex workloads, reduce our workload failure rates, and save us time
The visibility and control features are somewhat limited. This is a recognized weakness, but thee vendor is currently revamping the user interface to address it. While the current UI is a bit outdated, it's undergoing improvement. AutoSys Workload Automation has some areas for improvement, particularly in housekeeping and product maintenance. These tasks are currently quite manual and labor-intensive for our team. Additionally, the reporting and forecasting functionalities could be more robust. One area for improvement with AutoSys Workload Automation is that it comprises several distinct tools configured to work together. This necessitates familiarity with multiple tools for effective solution management. Consequently, it can sometimes lack a sense of cohesiveness as a unified solution.
Pedro Fuentes - PeerSpot reviewer
Cost-effective, excellent support, and centralized access and control
They have a department that handles requests for enhancements. I talked to Control-M guys back in October or November when they had a gathering here in Atlanta. We talked about not being able to go back in history in Helix Control-M for more than two weeks. We submitted a request for enhancement. They told us that they are working on it, and they are thinking of expanding that to 30 days. We would like to see it expand to 90 days, but they are working on it. In Control-M, we were able to go back 180 days, but that was on-prem. The storage of that data was on our own servers. We know that storage is money, and we do not expect them to store that much of the data, but at least 30 to 60 days seem proper.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"Automation of patch process."
"​We run millions of jobs through it every day using it for financial transactions, banking, credit cards, PeopleSoft, payroll, etc."
"It gives us flexibility when doing releases. We can make changes for one day in a PDS member, since we stage our jobs by date, and the next day the normal job definitions are run."
"It is stable, it works, and it does what it is supposed to."
"The flexibility in solving job scheduling challenges allows us to successfully integrate an acquired business’ fiscal close with our own, even though there is a lot of variance as to when they run in the calendar month."
"​It allows you to automate tasks, and reduce headcount, prevent errors, self-heal."
"The most valuable feature of AutoSys Workload Automation is user-friendliness. If someone has some knowledge of the tool they can use it."
"The features that I have found most valuable with AutoSys are that it is scalable, easy to use, fast, and always available. That's very important because if it's not steady then it's a real problem. So, at this point, we are satisfied with it."
"In Helix Control-M, we have the automation API that allows us to customize and do integrations easily in any script, such as Java or Python. It is all integrated within the integration API."
"The monitoring tool is very good. It's very easy for expert and entry-level users to use on short notice."
"The initial setup is straightforward."
"My organization has been able to script scheduled jobs in Control-M to potentially replace legacy products that are at end of life or end of service. The previous backup applications that were being used for specific files, folders, or applications were no longer being supported, therefore being able to use Control-M to replace that has been very valuable."
"It is simple to create, integrate, and automate data pipelines and to ingest data from different platforms. It integrates well between platforms."
"It has absolutely saved us time. It has made us more efficient. As far as the processing between systems, we don't have as many people. They have been able to focus on other efforts, because we have been able to automate more stuff with Control-M."
"The solution has the power to reduce resources, which is good for business. It is constantly updated to remain compatible with new technologies such as Amazon, Azure, and Google Cloud. It's very easy to take advantage of the compatibilities."
"It is very easy to use. The HA feature is also very good."
 

Cons

"Documentation and cross-application externals could be improved."
"The solution could improve by having support for container environments."
"CA Workload Automation is not part of CA's strategic vision going forward."
"​The cross-platform arena, where you can run work on multiple platforms, needs improvement."
"The graphical interface can be improved."
"Reduce the number of operational files. This would make the job of a system programmer supporting ESP easier."
"Some support issues need to be addressed, but not through email, through personal contact via phone or WebEx."
"The scalability is poor because I cannot use it for all automation solutions."
"The stability of Control-M has Not been great. A big thing we've been trying to work on with BMC is observability. Modern applications should be observable and resilient, but we're finding that sometimes Control-M is not very resilient and many times Control-M is not very observable."
"Control-M reporting isn't that good. It is very limited. We would like the ability to create our own reports as well as the ability to publish dashboards in the cloud, which would help us. Improved reporting will help us determine statuses and get the answers that we need. However, I personally think BMC is not focusing on the reporting. I have even visited the BMC office in India, and asked, "Why haven't you improved the reporting?""
"The reporting tool still needs a lot of improvement. It was supposed to get better with the upgrade, and it really didn't get better. It needs help, because it's such a useful thing to have. It needs to be more powerful and easier to use."
"I would like to see automatic license management. And probably more importantly, some kind of machine learning to help identify the optimum automation path."
"I would like not to have to reach out to a third-party application company to do automated notifications. Right now, we still have people manually calling people and emailing people. There's a company called xMatters - and there are others - that has an API through Control-M that can automate any aspect of failure management. I'd like to see it build right into the product. I'd like to see a better notification product."
"Some of the documentation could use some improvement, however, it gets you from point A to point B pretty quickly to get the solution in place."
"Advanced File Transfer (AFT) has limitations that cause us to use a bit more licensing than we feel is appropriate."
"The documentation could be improved, and I'd also like to see automatic upgrades."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"I certainly think the pricing is worth the value."
"The price of this solution is reasonable and there is an annual license required."
"People need to pay attention to how they use their ESP agents on the distributed platform. That's where some of the cost comes in, based on how many you need or how many you use."
"The return on investment would be very high because doing things manually without this product would be extremely expensive."
"Validate how many agents you need beforehand."
"CA pricing has been a problem, and not looked upon favorably here at all."
"It is overpriced."
"The pricing needs to be improved. Some of my client's complained that it was too expensive."
"You must accept that BMC licensing can be very confusing. No one can easily understand how they calculate things, whether it is user-based, job-based, or server-based. The calculation is quite tough. How BMC calculates licensing is not easily available anywhere."
"You're going to spend a lot of money upfront, but the benefits you're going to get out of it are going to quickly pay for it."
"In our environment, pricing depends on the total number of maximum jobs that can run, which is fine. Therefore, if the number of jobs increases, then the licensing fees will increase."
"The solution is not cheap, it comes with quite a hefty price tag. Control-M is the market leader, but we still want the price to be as friendly as possible."
"Pricing can be steep, but you get what you pay for."
"One of the restrictions that we had was with some of the licensing, and not having any insight on the financials part of the product. I don't know what the licensing on the product is, but we don't have an unlimited enterprise license. So, there might be a limitation on either the cost of the licensing or the number of seats."
"This is an expensive product compared to other solutions, although I think that it is a good one. We are in a good position with licensing, as we can run 10,000 jobs."
"The cost is basically $100 a job, give or take."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
48%
Manufacturing Company
10%
Computer Software Company
6%
Insurance Company
5%
Financial Services Firm
28%
Computer Software Company
13%
Manufacturing Company
8%
Insurance Company
6%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

How does Control-M compare with AutoSys Workload Automation?
Control-M acts as a single, centralized interface for monitoring and managing all batch processes, which is helpful because nothing gets left unattended since it is all visible in one place, and th...
What do you like most about AutoSys Workload Automation?
The most valuable aspects of AutoSys Workload Automation are its performance, scalability, and ease of getting started for new users.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for AutoSys Workload Automation?
The solution is costly. The pricing is based on the number of users, which for me, translates to approximately $120,000 to $130,000 for a license period of two to three years.
What do you like most about Control-M?
First of all, the shift from manual to automation has been valuable. We have a tool that can automate.
What needs improvement with Control-M?
The licensing cost can be improved. Although it provides good value, it could be better. The pricing model should be optimized. Its initial setup is a bit complex. They could provide more documenta...
 

Also Known As

CA Workload Automation, CA Workload Automation AE
Control M
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Gaumont, Mercantil do Brasil, CCEE, Hanwha Life
CARFAX, Tampa General Hospital, Navistar, Amadeus, Raymond James, Railinc
Find out what your peers are saying about AutoSys Workload Automation vs. Control-M and other solutions. Updated: March 2025.
845,040 professionals have used our research since 2012.