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BMC Helix ITSM vs IBM Maximo 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

BMC Helix ITSM
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
6.7
Number of Reviews
78
Ranking in other categories
Help Desk Software (4th), IT Service Management (ITSM) (4th)
IBM Maximo
Average Rating
8.0
Number of Reviews
23
Ranking in other categories
Enterprise Asset Management (EAM) (1st), Billing Software (4th)
 

Mindshare comparison

BMC Helix ITSM and IBM Maximo aren’t in the same category and serve different purposes. BMC Helix ITSM is designed for IT Service Management (ITSM) and holds a mindshare of 11.4%, down 13.3% compared to last year.
IBM Maximo, on the other hand, focuses on Enterprise Asset Management (EAM), holds 28.7% mindshare, up 26.7% since last year.
IT Service Management (ITSM)
Enterprise Asset Management (EAM)
 

Featured Reviews

Fairoz Gadad - PeerSpot reviewer
Development team is quick to address bugs or shortcomings in their product
BMC's technical support team needs to improve. Right now, the problem over here is we are not getting the exact answers on time. Their engineers are mainly based in the US or Israel, and we get comprehensive dedicated support. Some of the Indian customer service representatives are also outstanding. Unfortunately, in the past six months or seven months, I've been getting brand-new engineers. Either they're not entirely aware of most cases, or they don't know how to troubleshoot further. So for any product to be stable and work correctly, BMC must ensure that customer service is excellent. Even though if your product is a hundred percent, we'll have problems marketing it to our customers.
Jose Pedro Muñoz - PeerSpot reviewer
A very strong and powerful tool in the market preferred by a variety of industries
I rate the technical support a seven out of ten. Three levels of support in IBM. The first one is a fixed level, while levels two and three are very good. Here, level one is not very good, as it takes time to go from level one to level two and from level two to level three. So, level one is of low capacity.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"Reports have helped us to improve our IT processes. The main benefit is providing the right information to our decision makers."
"BMC Smart IT is somewhat rigid, but they have a powerful backend that supports our complex need for extension versus customization. Between extension and customization, you can achieve complex business processes. That's one of the main advantages of BMC."
"I like the single sign-on and that administrators can customize."
"The most valuable features of BMC Helix ITSM are the service level management, configuration, and reporting tool."
"It's one of the top solutions on the market for ITSM capabilities."
"The most valuable feature for our customers using BMC Helix ITSM is change management."
"The most valuable features of BMC Helix ITSM are its customization ability and the addition of new features. As a built-in Suite, it covers all that is needed in the IT guidelines, which is good. Each customer has their own needs, and the customization the solution provides is beneficial."
"Initial setup is straightforward, and if you follow best practices, then future enhancements will be smoother."
"The large range of configurability of the product is great, since everyone has a different way of doing things."
"Has a powerful audit combination that helps achieve high accuracy."
"Preventive maintenance management."
"The most valuable feature is the ability to correct maintenance."
"The incident management feature is good because it allows you to keep track of and classify issues."
"The ability to configure and integrate it with other solutions for ERP."
"They have a real strength of tracking the asset itself along with the condition of the asset, the maintenance of the asset and who has access to the asset, etc."
"The most valuable features are the ability to create work orders and preventative maintenance."
 

Cons

"In the next release, I would like to see AI used for classification or categorization."
"They should add some of the bolt-ons into the initial setup, such as chat."
"There are plugins to the solution that have come onto the market, so the solution should also be updated in terms of administration to increase efficiency."
"It needs to be more comfortable for the end-user."
"It's expensive, particularly in the emerging market where you see a lot of customers that have a budget crunch over issues."
"It takes a long-time to plan and deploy the on-premise solution."
"The documentation could improve in BMC Helix ITSM."
"It has created more layers of bureaucracy."
"The mobile solution has a lot of room for improvement, especially in geopositioning capabilities, tracking capabilities, and configuration capabilities, in order to let the tech operate online and offline.​"
"Areas for improvement would be the user interface and support for Arabic. They could also be more customer-oriented."
"It was very slow due to the lagging issues. So that was kind of frustrating, considering how slow it was while functioning."
"This solution could improve by integrating or embedding finances, charts of accounts, and invoicing."
"IBM Maximo can improve the financial support and financial application, to make it more similar to an ERP as opposed to an EAM. Overall they can improve the financial processes."
"The standard reports that shipped with the package need to be enriched with more advanced reports, especially for the Inventory Management sections."
"The interface is not very easy or user-friendly and is in need of improvement."
"It's not user-friendly. It could use shortcuts for frequently requested services."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"While purchasing, try to negotiate on per user licensing costs, associated maintenance, and purchase 20% more then what you think you should have. Bulk is always cheaper."
"Just make sure you really sit down and look at what you will be using per user, therefore you will not be surprised with a big bill. You do not want every user having every license, it really is not needed."
"I rate the product price an eight on a scale of one to ten, where one is cheap, and ten is expensive. The solution is expensive."
"We did not compare the price of BMC Helix ITSM to other vendors. However, it has a mid-range price."
"It is costly, but it is well worth it."
"It is too expensive for a small business."
"The price of BMC Helix ITSM is expensive."
"The cost is relatively high, especially for the BMC Controller application. However, the expense is justified by the standard and reliable features it offers. This product's reputation in the market is strong, providing assurance in terms of data and other considerations."
"Where available, concurrent licenses can be more cost efficient and provide more flexibility."
"You pay for what you get. There are lots of options depending on how you would like to implement Maximo."
"Explore the possibility of using DB2. You will avoid the cost of SQL Server or Oracle licenses."
"The concurrent user license is much more effective in management and cost-wise, as it is more suitable for maintenance management."
"IBM has changed the licensing policy. As I understand now, they are going from a complex way of licensing to a more simple way of licensing."
"The price of IBM Maximo could reduce, it is expensive."
"$USD700 per agent user."
"​Explore internal processes in order to evaluate the correct number of users in each Maximo module, then evaluate the different offers of pricing and licensing.​"
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Computer Software Company
18%
Financial Services Firm
15%
Government
9%
Manufacturing Company
8%
Educational Organization
34%
Energy/Utilities Company
9%
Manufacturing Company
8%
Government
8%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about BMC Helix ITSM?
If we consider major players like Ford or BMW, their core focus is manufacturing products like cars. To ensure smooth operations, any arising issues, be it security concerns or issues within depart...
What needs improvement with BMC Helix ITSM?
BMC Helix ITSM is difficult for us to customize, and most customizations require vendor support, which leads to extra costs. The interface should be more user-friendly, and the customization should...
What is your primary use case for BMC Helix ITSM?
We are currently using BMC Helix ITSM in our organization. We are in the process of implementing new modules like CMDB and discovery.
What do you like most about IBM Maximo?
It can be particularly useful for power line operations, enabling linemen in the field to gather information and send it across the country as well as different parts of the world.
What needs improvement with IBM Maximo?
Though I liked it a lot, I think it was lagging a lot. It was very slow due to the lagging issues. So that was kind of frustrating, considering how slow it was while functioning. The aforementioned...
What is your primary use case for IBM Maximo?
It can be particularly useful for power line operations, enabling linemen in the field to gather information and send it across the country as well as different parts of the world. With IBM Maximo,...
 

Also Known As

Remedy ITSM, Remedy, Helix Remedy
Maximo
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Brookfield, HealthSouth Corporation, Lockheed Martin Aeronautics, Mercator, SAP, Stanford University
Royal Boskalis Westminster N.V., DTE Energy, Swedish Match, Projetech, Fingrid, East Coast
Find out what your peers are saying about ServiceNow, Atlassian, ManageEngine and others in IT Service Management (ITSM). Updated: March 2025.
842,767 professionals have used our research since 2012.