Sparx Systems Enterprise Architect vs erwin Evolve by Quest comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive Summary
 

Categories and Ranking

erwin Evolve by Quest
Ranking in Enterprise Architecture Management
9th
Ranking in Business Process Design
16th
Average Rating
7.8
Number of Reviews
19
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
Sparx Systems Enterprise Ar...
Ranking in Enterprise Architecture Management
2nd
Ranking in Business Process Design
4th
Average Rating
8.0
Number of Reviews
97
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Market share comparison

As of June 2024, in the Enterprise Architecture Management category, the market share of erwin Evolve by Quest is 2.1% and it decreased by 7.6% compared to the previous year. The market share of Sparx Systems Enterprise Architect is 14.7% and it decreased by 32.0% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Enterprise Architecture Management
Unique Categories:
Business Process Design
0.5%
 

Featured Reviews

ScottLawson - PeerSpot reviewer
Jun 22, 2023
Enables us to present data and objects visually, in diagrams, and to make them available via the web. Also enables web-based editing of data.
We tried their collaborative web modeling and we used it with a few people but we tend to not use that piece. We tend to collaborate with the people and then my team of architects draws up the diagram using the modeling tool. We then iterate through those. I would like to use it, but it was a little clunky when they first rolled it out. Overall, it's more about the company having room for improvement. What they need to do is to consolidate more of their products. For example, I was just looking and I couldn't figure out what erwin DT is. It's on the website but it would help if they could put information together and make it more clear as to what products they have and how they work with other things. I hear them talking in the support forums and, when I talk to the representative, they say they're going to do a bunch of stuff but it seems the progress is slow. The changes they need to make are to take their old, legacy product, which we use, and focus a lot on it so they can transform it into a modern cloud tool so that we have fewer little pieces to deal with. They could also fix their security model. It's very confusing to get new people onto the tool and to make sure that your content isn't being exposed to the wrong people.
PP
Nov 21, 2023
It allows us to validate design changes and give an indication of the code before speaking with developers.​​ Collaborating on a medium to large model resulted in significant performance problems.
Be realistic about what you team can achieve. In a single use situation there is little advise needed but if you are intending to deliver it into an organisation, ensure that * The way it will change how you work is possible (considering people and processes) * The cost is reasonable * The competition has been assessed using a POC not marketing ware (e.g. Orbus) * The training impact is understood (The tool is not trival to use) * The business view is not ignored. In my experience this tool does not remove the need to render information for a business audience separately and neither does tools like Orbus.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"I have not seen capabilities for web-sharing and interaction with the architecture from any other supplier. It's a great capability..."
"I really liked that it mapped out processes and was able to attach the data model to the appropriate process. You could map out the process, then when you got down to a specific couple of data elements, you could attach the table in the database that supported that process. You could connect it with erwin Data Modeler for that."
"By placing the data and the metadata into a model, which is what the tool does, you gain the abilities for linkages between different objects in the model, linkages that you cannot get on paper or with Visio or PowerPoint. That is a huge discriminator."
"The feature that stands out for me is the ease of configuring objects and the screens to show them. It's really easy to add a new type of object in this reference. Creating a new type of object, using it, and evolving it a little bit in terms of what we can document about it are the main features that made us decide to use this provider."
"Evolve is like a tank. You can do whatever you want with the solution, but you need to customize it. I think that it's not very aligned with the framework for enterprise architecture. MEGA is focused on these enterprise architectures, but it's only for that. With Evolve, you can do everything you want with professional services."
"Workgroup Repository collection of data models allows research across models without worry about platform incompatibilities and provides easy KPIs about corporate data assets."
"We use erwin Evolve to publish to the website. This allows us to enable publishing our website using parameterisation features. In a very fast, quick way, we can publish a table or chart onto a website."
"There is a model behind it. It's really nice that the Evolve front-end, as it builds a website, keeps those relationships in mind. You can even go to a procedure and see all the applications that are related to it. Then you can go into that application and see all the standard operating procedures that that application is a part of. It's just very connected."
"We have found the stability to be very reliable."
"Sparx Systems Enterprise Architect was easy to set up and it took just twenty minutes."
"The TOGAF ADM model is most valuable. It is also very cheap as compared to other options in the market."
"We use it to develop and maintain the Enterprise Conceptual Model, migrated from erwin a couple of years ago."
"Large variety of profiles and frameworks available out-of-the-box without the need for customization."
"The system provides powerful tools for obtaining reports and documentation."
"The most valuable feature of Sparx Systems Enterprise Architect is the value streams."
"It is a very flexible product. It can do a lot. It is also a reliable product."
 

Cons

"The solution's integration capabilities with other tools in our system has not been all that well done. We have people who use ARIS, who use System Architect and, of course, Visio. erwin has very limited ways to import and export from those kinds of tools. It's not a very easy thing to do."
"I feel that the UML drawing capability needs to be improved."
"The solution needs to focus on allowing for more integrations."
"I would like to see an improvement in the output of the solution."
"Add some ability to do conditional Visualization on the models and in reports (some ideas) – maybe as a specialized Theme or Diagram or Display."
"It could have had a more streamlined navigation. It seemed that when you went to the explorer panel, there were just so many different ways of doing the work that I could not remember, "How did I do this? How did I get to that point in that model to get back to it?" If I wanted to build a new one, where do I start? It just seemed like there was such a smorgasbord of ways of doing it that it was just overwhelming."
"There might be improvement required to better support some of the MPP databases for non-relational data structures and NoSQL databases."
"I would like it to be easier to make changes and then deploy them into production, especially when you have multiple web servers or front-ends. It would be nice to make a change and then have it propagate to the production servers in a more automated fashion."
"The reporting needs improvement."
"More challenging than other tools to maintain documents and document versions for an architecture board review."
"It would be nice to have it supported on the Linux operating system."
"One room for improvement in Sparx Systems Enterprise Architect is that it's not very friendly. Another room for improvement in the tool is that it doesn't enable you to import the metadata from a database very easily, so reverse engineering of a database was very difficult. Its database modeling and entity-relationship modeling functions need improvement."
"Its best features are not intuitive or easy to learn. Most companies I have worked with, when I see what they are doing with it , are not using more than 5% of what they could and should be doing with it."
"The documentation could be better. Where I work, we speak French and we don't speak English, so we don't have anything in French. It's perfect in English, but we need something in French."
"The presentation graphics need to be improved in future builds."
"It should be made Windows compatible."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"Unless you are a one person shop – always go with the Workgroup edition and Concurrent licensing."
"Yearly, our cost is €100,000."
"The licensing enables you to differentiate between people who edit the content and the people who consume it. We are able to keep the licensing costs down by keeping the "contributor" licenses to a minimum, and we then just roll out the content in a read-only version for the rest of our users."
"I think erwin is quite expensive. I have difficulty selling the portal, in fact."
"I estimate that we pay between $40,000 and $50,000 a year for the solution, not including the upfront costs to buy things the first time."
"On a yearly basis, our licensing costs are 50,000 euro. There are no additional costs because we are on a SaaS model."
"The cost is something like $15,000, per license. But I haven't looked at those numbers in three years. It was over $100,000 to initially set everything up and get it all configured."
"It’s the best deal in town, by far."
"I rate the solution's pricing a five out of ten."
"Use floating licenses strategically."
"Its price is very good for the value that you get with it."
"Licenses are pretty low cost compared to, for example, ARIS."
"It is very economical and low cost. You have to pay for a one-time license, and it is active forever."
"In terms of cost, Sparx EA is probably one of the cheapest tools I have ever used."
"The license I use is on-premise. We haven't gone to the cloud where we have to pay monthly or something like that. Sparx is cheaper than most similar tools."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
20%
Computer Software Company
13%
Government
8%
Manufacturing Company
8%
Educational Organization
14%
Government
12%
Financial Services Firm
11%
Computer Software Company
10%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about erwin Evolve?
Evolve's reverse engineering ability is quite useful.
What needs improvement with erwin Evolve?
Evolve is primarily focused on the entity's licenses diagrams, but it would be nice if erwin could integrate case development, so that it shows the ER diagram plus certain inputs on the use cases a...
What do you like most about Sparx Systems Enterprise Architect?
The stability has been good and satisfactory. I would rate the stability a ten out of ten.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Sparx Systems Enterprise Architect?
It's reasonably priced for large organizations, though it may be perceived as expensive for individual users.
What needs improvement with Sparx Systems Enterprise Architect?
In general, we now have a problem with Sparx Enterprise Architect because many analysts think it's too complicated to use in a giant environment. So, two years ago, it was used very, very often, an...
 

Also Known As

erwin EA, erwin Business Process, erwin Enterprise Architecture
No data available
 

Learn More

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Overview

 

Sample Customers

AT&T, Bank of America, Chevron, Duke University, ESPN, Fidelity, GE, JP Morgan Chase, KPMG, McGraw Hill, NASA, Pfizer, Royal Bank of Scotland, Teradata, Union Pacific, Vodafone, Wells Fargo.
OmniLink
Find out what your peers are saying about Sparx Systems Enterprise Architect vs. erwin Evolve by Quest and other solutions. Updated: May 2024.
787,104 professionals have used our research since 2012.