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AWS Step Functions vs IBM Business Automation Workflow comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Dec 18, 2024

Review summaries and opinions

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

ROI

Sentiment score
9.5
AWS Step Functions reduce development time and costs, enhance scalability and reliability, streamline workflows, and improve ROI.
Sentiment score
7.5
IBM Business Automation Workflow boosts ROI through productivity, cost savings, and digital transformation, benefiting IT infrastructure efficiency.
 

Customer Service

Sentiment score
6.4
AWS Step Functions' customer service is mostly positive, with praised enterprise support and mixed reviews on smaller-scale responsiveness.
Sentiment score
5.7
IBM Business Automation Workflow support is effective with variations in response timeliness and requires detailed information for best results.
I use enterprise support, which is excellent, providing responses within fifteen minutes.
If the solution is readily available to IBM support team, they provide it instantly.
 

Scalability Issues

Sentiment score
7.8
AWS Step Functions is highly scalable and cost-effective, adapting seamlessly to demand fluctuations for teams of all sizes.
Sentiment score
7.8
IBM Business Automation Workflow offers scalable solutions, supporting high transaction volumes and adaptability for enterprise growth, despite some customization limitations.
Starting separate Step Functions for each request, making it highly scalable.
We are implementing load balancing and horizontal scalability.
 

Stability Issues

Sentiment score
8.5
AWS Step Functions are rated highly stable by users, ensured by redundancy and strategies for high availability and reliability.
Sentiment score
7.7
IBM Business Automation Workflow is stable, especially with best practices, auto-scaling, load balancing, and proper maintenance resolving initial issues.
If one zone fails, others handle the demand, ensuring high availability.
 

Room For Improvement

AWS Step Functions requires improvements in data limits, pricing, features, integrations, IDE support, and hybrid cloud integration.
IBM Business Automation Workflow needs better integration, UI, analytics, cloud migration, and support, with enhanced flexibility and cost-effectiveness.
Many developments are focused on AI, LLM models, and data science.
 

Setup Cost

AWS Step Functions pricing varies based on requests and workflow duration, requiring careful configuration to avoid unpredictable costs.
IBM Business Automation Workflow, though costly, offers robust features and flexible licensing, making it a valuable productivity investment.
Pricing for Step Functions is very cheap.
The cost is average, provided it is configured correctly.
 

Valuable Features

AWS Step Functions seamlessly integrate AWS tools, enhancing workflow efficiency with scalable task management, visualization, and error handling.
IBM Business Automation Workflow centralizes automation tools with low-code features, enhancing efficiency and agility in process management.
AWS Step Functions offers advanced workflows that save time and enhance efficiency by reducing delays and ensuring consistent orchestration among various services.
Step Functions provide seamless integration with AWS services, which enhances the speed of application development.
We have integrations with different banks, ERP systems, and other human resource management systems by integrating through different systems.
 

Categories and Ranking

AWS Step Functions
Ranking in Business Process Management (BPM)
11th
Average Rating
8.2
Reviews Sentiment
7.3
Number of Reviews
12
Ranking in other categories
Workload Automation (13th)
IBM Business Automation Wor...
Ranking in Business Process Management (BPM)
14th
Average Rating
7.8
Reviews Sentiment
6.7
Number of Reviews
24
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of January 2025, in the Business Process Management (BPM) category, the mindshare of AWS Step Functions is 2.3%, down from 3.6% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of IBM Business Automation Workflow is 2.2%, down from 2.6% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Business Process Management (BPM)
 

Featured Reviews

Carlos Alberto Marangon - PeerSpot reviewer
Automate complex workflows with seamless AWS integration
Step Functions provide seamless integration with AWS services, which enhances the speed of application development. The JSON app launched recently allows us to define data execution more easily. The Standard Workflows feature includes error replay capabilities, which are crucial for efficient error management. The Amazon State Language (ASL) in JSON format facilitates workflow automation and accelerates the deployment of Step Functions.
Bhasker ReddyPIdintla - PeerSpot reviewer
Creates workflows and removes the delays encountered with approvals
The tool streamlines operations, especially from an operational perspective, by facilitating decision-making and ensuring timely approvals. This helps prevent delays in the approval process, where business process management adds significant value for us. What I find most valuable is how it creates process instances and handles issues. There's no delay in addressing process issues and getting approvals on time. It provides a product-agnostic approach to business process management, allowing us to create workflows quickly. Case management helps us create, handle, and resolve cases step by step, providing an end-to-end solution. It's especially useful when using cloud-based business automation, often including built-in case management features. The main benefit is creating workflows. For example, with IBM BAW, we can handle end-to-end processes, from taking requests to assigning tasks for approvals. It can also integrate with third-party APIs and business rules to make decisions, providing flexibility in our operations. AI is integrated into the IBM BAW in two main ways. First, we can use RPA for tasks requiring human intervention. Second, we can leverage IBM's Watson AI to accelerate business processes with automation. I can predict how soon requests will be approved and decide based on certain criteria. For example, let's consider our recent implementation in the customer care center. When customers call in, they often have common queries. We've incorporated AI features to address these queries by leveraging data from our customer database. We use tools like OpenAI. Additionally, we've automated most processes for business process automation to minimize the need for human intervention. However, we hold requests for certain scenarios until a resource takes action. But for common tasks that can be automated quickly, we've integrated AI and machine learning features to expedite approvals.
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
33%
Manufacturing Company
10%
Computer Software Company
10%
Healthcare Company
6%
Financial Services Firm
38%
Computer Software Company
10%
Government
7%
Manufacturing Company
6%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about Amazon Step Functions?
The integration capability is easy, whereas building state machines is tricky.
What is your primary use case for Amazon Step Functions?
I use Step Functions for orchestrating several application workflows. Specifically, I often use Step Functions to automate processes requiring multiple steps and for application orchestration. I fo...
What advice do you have for others considering Amazon Step Functions?
Overall, I would rate AWS Step Functions at least nine out of ten. The technology is robust, but improving the payload size could enhance the product's utility further.
Which is better, IBM BPM or IBM Business Automation Workflow?
We researched both IBM solutions and in the end, we chose Business Automation Workflow. IBM BPM has a good user interface and the BPM coach is a helpful tool. The API is very useful in providing en...
What do you like most about IBM Business Automation Workflow?
The most valuable feature of IBM Business Automation Workflow is cost management.
 

Also Known As

Amazon Step Functions, Step Functions
Business Automation Workflow
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Alpha Apps, The Guardian, SGK, Bigfinite
Key Bank, Barclays, Control€xpert, MIR Insurance Brokers, Conqord Oil
Find out what your peers are saying about AWS Step Functions vs. IBM Business Automation Workflow and other solutions. Updated: January 2025.
831,997 professionals have used our research since 2012.