PeerSpot user
Practice Lead at Sky Solutions, LLC
Real User
Top 20
User-friendly, customizable, good support, and reasonably priced
Pros and Cons
  • "I like everything about the entire BPM that comes with the BPM suite."
  • "The migration strategy needs to be improved."

What is our primary use case?

The primary use case of this solution is for migrating IBM BPM to Camunda.

How has it helped my organization?

We helped our customer to reduce their licensing and operational costs to a larger extent by proposing Camunda BPM to replace existing BPM solution. They were very much impressed with the capabilities of Camunda BPM and started migrating to Camunda BPM

What is most valuable?

I like everything about the entire BPM that comes with the BPM suite. It's more intuitive and they are enhancing the product very effectively year after year.

It's a customizable product and it's user-friendly.

What needs improvement?

I don't see many issues with this product.

The migration strategy needs to be improved. Most of the financial institutions in North America are looking towards open source BPM to replace their existing existing BPM platform.Camunda has already started working on a plugin to mgirate any kind of BPM workflows to Camunda BPM seamlessly. They have just released a beta plugin to migrate Legacy BPM processes to Camunda BPM. If they make it as a full-featured version, that would be a lot of help with migration projects. 

Buyer's Guide
Camunda
April 2024
Learn what your peers think about Camunda. Get advice and tips from experienced pros sharing their opinions. Updated: April 2024.
768,924 professionals have used our research since 2012.

For how long have I used the solution?

I have been using Camunda BPM for six years.

We are using the latest version of this solution.

What do I think about the stability of the solution?

It's a stable solution. We have not had any issues.

What do I think about the scalability of the solution?

It's highly scalable and offers high availability. We used eight in a containerless server and also on a shared server.

I have work with different organizations, particularly with Camunda BPM. These organizations that we have recently started with are still in the beginning stages of the practice. Previously, we had heavy usage and had to support two to three clients simultaneously.

How are customer service and support?

Technical support has been very helpful, even during the RFP phase. If we needed to verify anything then we could speak to the sales head directly, as well as to the product team.

Which solution did I use previously and why did I switch?

Previously, I worked with JBPM, which was an open-sourced BPM.

How was the initial setup?

The initial setup was straightforward. We didn't have any issues.

The only issues we could have would be with our code.

What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?

When compared with the proprietary products, the pricing costs are much less, even though it is an enterprise edition. It's very minimal. 

My customers and I are very happy with the pricing cost and the features.

Pricing depends on the number of tasks we use.

Which other solutions did I evaluate?

Yes. We evaluated JBPM and Activiti BPM before finalizing Camunda

What other advice do I have?

I would definitely recommend this solution, especially if they are spending a large amount of money using proprietary BPM tools, such as Pega BPM.

I would rate this solution an eight out of ten.

Which deployment model are you using for this solution?

Public Cloud
Disclosure: I am a real user, and this review is based on my own experience and opinions.
PeerSpot user
IT-Services Manager & Solution Architect at Stratis
Real User
A flexible solution that allows you to have a BPM bot with your own UI
Pros and Cons
  • "There's this graphic that tells you how many lines or how many tickets are in each step. In that way, you know where you stand. I find this feature very valuable."
  • "Documentation can be improved."

What is our primary use case?

We had a client who wanted to use a BPM to track user subscriptions on their website. They had 20 steps from different areas and different people who wanted to join as new users of their services. 

We had to use Camunda BPM to track those services because they used to lose track of some clients in the past. They then had to spend more, add some more steps, and add new user subscriptions for months. 

The key here was always to track a new user and guarantee that they will get subscribed to their service in good time.

What is most valuable?

There's this graphic that tells you how many lines or how many tickets are in each step. In that way, you know where you stand. I find this feature very valuable.  

These are your bottlenecks, and you can see what the tasks are, the problems, see how much time must be spent on them. Then you can propose to fix it or make some improvements to make things go faster.

What needs improvement?

Documentation can be improved. Right now, the documentation isn't properly organized. We have a lot of documentation. We follow the instructions. We follow some blogs and videos on YouTube. But it doesn't feel like we have all the information we need to implement Camunda BPM.

For how long have I used the solution?

I have been using Camunda BPM for two years.

What do I think about the stability of the solution?

Camunda BPM is a stable solution.

What do I think about the scalability of the solution?

Camunda BPM is a scalable solution. It's a JAVA-based application, and we were able to install it in AWS and do all the things we wanted to do. 

How was the initial setup?

The initial setup was complex. We really needed to study and understand how it worked. It was difficult because we didn't have enough information in the manuals.

We did what was said in the manual and then wanted to do more. We watched several videos, and we started to connect the dots. With our own solutions or conclusions, we were able to implement Camunda BPM.

What about the implementation team?

We implemented Camunda BPM by ourselves, in-house. 

What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?

I think Camunda BPM can improve their licensing costs. It isn't easy to find clients with Camunda BPM licenses mainly because it's quite expensive. I think the license for an on-premise system is about $50,000, and that's expensive when you have only 100 users.

Which other solutions did I evaluate?

I used Bizagi before. It's easier to implement, but the problem is that you have to use their suite. You have to use their screen, their admin screens, or user screens. The UX and UI experience is also not good.

We decided to go with Camunda BPM because it gave us what we needed. That is, we can get inside Camunda and use only the tracker of the application. We don't need to use mandatory things like your pages or your web forms.

We can really code what we want and use it. We can create our own UI while using Camunda BPM at the same time. We really liked that because in my company specifically, we use a lot of UX, so all the UIs were very important for us.

Camunda BPM allows us to have a BPM bot with our own UI, and that's what we liked most about Camunda.

What other advice do I have?

I would advise potential Camunda BPM customers to be patient. Perhaps all the information isn't available in one click, but it's possible to implement Camunda BPM, and it's quite flexible. It's worth a try.

On a scale from one to ten, I would give Camunda BPM an eight. 

Which deployment model are you using for this solution?

On-premises
Disclosure: My company has a business relationship with this vendor other than being a customer: Consultant
PeerSpot user
Buyer's Guide
Camunda
April 2024
Learn what your peers think about Camunda. Get advice and tips from experienced pros sharing their opinions. Updated: April 2024.
768,924 professionals have used our research since 2012.
Vice President & Account CTO at a tech services company with 10,001+ employees
Consultant
Open BPM means users and developers can easily work together; for our needs, it lacks a strong forms designer
Pros and Cons
  • "It has an open BPM"
  • "Lacking in forms visualization."

What is our primary use case?

Our primary use case for Camunda is as a process orchestration layer to help prioritize tasks for users as they were designing downstream systems. Camunda is a way to push the rules to the downstream systems. We are partly a reseller, but we also implement and we are the systems integrator. I'm the vice president and account CCO of our company. 

What is most valuable?

One valuable feature of Camunda is that it's an open BPM, so it was easier for users and developers to work together to define the rules and define the process, given their BPM and standard architecture. This also allowed us to expose the rules and the business process itself into a standard model, which wasn't possible with other tools and softwares we've used in the past. Finally, the engine itself is lightweight so it was easier for us to handle deployments and in production it didn't have a great demand of the infrastructure.

What needs improvement?

I think there is room for improvement along with the process. Camunda doesn't have a strong forms designer. While that is an advantage in one scenario in that we were able to bring a third party UI, it was lacking in forms visualization and it would be good to have some kind of a strong forms designer that allows development along with the process.

More often, we are seeing BPM used in conjunction with other automation technologies like RPA and AI. If Camunda were to be placed as a central BPM, it would need a better integration mechanism.

For how long have I used the solution?

I've been using this solution for two years. 

What other advice do I have?

I would rate this solution a seven out of 10. 

Which deployment model are you using for this solution?

On-premises
Disclosure: I am a real user, and this review is based on my own experience and opinions.
PeerSpot user
Chief, Service Delivery at IGA
Real User
Enables us to document all of the processors and VPN and has many features
Pros and Cons
  • "We are documenting all of the processors and VPN. Then we are sharing it with our business users."
  • "When you search for Camunda BPM resources or books on how to utilize Camunda BPM, it is lacking. When it comes to Alfresco, there are thousands of resources that can help you to utilize within AWS and its Group Services. I would like to see the usage of Camunda BPM on Amazon Web Services be improved."

What is our primary use case?

We're planning and exploring moving to the Enterprise Edition. We find some functionality for the migration to be helpful for us. This is why we might move to the Enterprise Edition.

How has it helped my organization?

We are currently using Community Edition and then looking to move to Enterprise Edition possibly soon.

What is most valuable?

We are using the latest version of Camunda BPM. We keep upgrading to each new release. We keep always moving with less change. There are a lot of features in Camunda BPM.

We are documenting all of the processors and VPN. Then we share it with our business users so they can approve our other process. From the technical part, what we did was exposing Camunda BPM as a web service.

We configured a split between the process and the business. If there are any changes in the business, we are changing it in the process. If there is no impact, we don't need to redeploy our configuration settings again and again. 

This was something that saved us time and improved our data center processes.

What needs improvement?

We were discussing Alfresco. They were saying that their product is much better than Camunda BPM. We signed the governance policy for "Cloud First". 

When you search for Camunda BPM resources or books on how to utilize Camunda BPM, it is lacking. When it comes to Alfresco, there are thousands of resources that can help you to utilize within AWS and its Group Services. I would like to see the usage of Camunda BPM on Amazon Web Services be improved.

For Camunda BPM, the sense of community is lacking. The company itself is based in Germany. Alfresco is a very small company with an open source community. It is really good and it works perfectly. It was easy for us to adopt it. 

We are proposing that Camunda BPM can be offered as a web service. What could be improved is better support for AWS and training provided with the platform to make it easier to use.

For how long have I used the solution?

We've been using the Community Edition for three to four years.

What do I think about the stability of the solution?

Camunda BPM is very stable.

What do I think about the scalability of the solution?

We didn't experience any issues with the scalability of Camunda BPM. It has good scalability by default. We are in Information Authority and we're looking on behalf of other government agencies, i.e., the civil service correspondence system.

We are creating different systems for the VPN to meet the processes. We are using Camunda BPM for 200 to 300 users. We use it almost every day.

How was the initial setup?

We took responsibility for the setup and it was straightforward with community help

What about the implementation team?

We implemented the setup of Camunda BPM on our own. We did everything in-house. Within a week, it was done. We implemented pretty fast.

What other advice do I have?

We're very strongly recommending Camunda BPM. It is good. It is easy. The community is good. There is a lot of support if you are stuck anywhere. You can Google it and find the answers. Many people are using Camunda BPM worldwide and finding the responses was easy. 

I would rate it an eight out of ten. The reason why I wouldn't rate it a 10/10 or higher is that there are some other features available within other tools that can improve the algorithms they are not aware of yet.

Camunda BPM satisfies our requirements and we have been using it for a year.

Disclosure: I am a real user, and this review is based on my own experience and opinions.
PeerSpot user
Managing consultant at a computer software company with 10,001+ employees
Real User
Easy to use and user friendly
Pros and Cons
  • "It's user friendly, much better than most tools I have seen."
  • "The documentation could use improvement."

What is our primary use case?

We use the free version because our organization is a consulting organization and we work normally for customers. My primary use case is for training and modeling purposes.

I use the BPMN and the DMN model. 

What is most valuable?

The most valuable feature is that it is easy to use. I train my colleagues and customers and I don't want them to need to learn how the solution works. I want to be the one who learns about the product and teach them BPMN. 

It's user friendly, much better than most tools I have seen.

What needs improvement?

The documentation could use improvement. 

For how long have I used the solution?

I have been using Camunda for two years. 

What do I think about the stability of the solution?

For modeling it's very stable. At the execution level, I don't have experience.

What do I think about the scalability of the solution?

I think it is scalable, but I don't have experience with scaling it. 

How was the initial setup?

The initial setup of this platform was very simple.

What other advice do I have?

Often more functions will make a model or tool more complex. I like the simplicity of Camunda. It is very easy to use. 

Disclosure: I am a real user, and this review is based on my own experience and opinions.
PeerSpot user
PMO Office Digital Transformation, Ministry of the Interior at a manufacturing company with 1,001-5,000 employees
Real User
Stable and easy to start using, but it's difficult to modify a process
Pros and Cons
  • "The most valuable feature is that, with a visual system, you can try to have a process client before beginning the programming for the application."
  • "Camunda could be improved by making it easier to modify a process. You can program it to follow a process, but it is difficult to modify the process when the application is in use. It could also be improved by making it easier to use the visual platform without needing to be informed on that. Sometimes, we programmers haven't used it in the past, and it's a bit difficult to learn it."

What is our primary use case?

Our primary use case of Camunda is for following a process in our applications. Camunda is a work process product. We are developing some applications and when we want them to follow a specific process, we use Camunda to help the programmers follow that process we want to achieve. 

We are using a version of the free service they provide, but I'm unsure which version it is. Camunda is deployed on-premise. 

What is most valuable?

The most valuable feature is that, with a visual system, you can try to have a process client before beginning the programming for the application. 

What needs improvement?

Camunda could be improved by making it easier to modify a process. You can program it to follow a process, but it is difficult to modify the process when the application is in use. It could also be improved by making it easier to use the visual platform without needing to be informed on that. Sometimes, we programmers haven't used it in the past, and it's a bit difficult to learn it. 

For how long have I used the solution?

I have been using Camunda for two years. 

What do I think about the stability of the solution?

The stability is quite good. It's not used on a daily basis right now, but when we deploy the application, which is massive, it will be used daily. Camunda is stable, but there is some difficulty in changing the process. 

What do I think about the scalability of the solution?

We will see how the scalability is in a few weeks, but we are going to do some trials and testing on the scalability. For the past two years, Camunda has been used to develop a new system, a very big system application, that is going to be used here in Spain. In a few weeks, it will be used by about 1,000 final users. As far as the programmers and technical people working with it, there are about 50 people. 

How are customer service and support?

We haven't contacted technical support yet, but in the future, we will try to contact them in order to improve the platform and have new versions. We may go for the paid version, so we will have to contact them. We have been able to resolve any issues without contacting their technical support. 

How was the initial setup?

I think the setup process is simple. It's not very complex because we have installed it several times for the development area and for the production and we have not had any problems. I think deployment took no more than about two or three days—it was not difficult. 

What about the implementation team?

We implemented this solution through an in-house team. The installation was done internally, by the systems area in our company. 

What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?

Camunda has a free service as well as a commercial service. We are using the free service. 

In the future, we may pay for maintenance services. We haven't had to do any maintenance yet, but we plan to buy some package or product in order to handle the maintenance. 

What other advice do I have?

I rate Camunda a seven out of ten. I would recommend the paid version of Camunda because of the difficulties we have had with the free version. It's easy to start using, but it's difficult to make changes. 

Which deployment model are you using for this solution?

On-premises
Disclosure: I am a real user, and this review is based on my own experience and opinions.
PeerSpot user
it_user1425228 - PeerSpot reviewer
Sr. Process Analyst at OTP Bank Romania S.A.
Real User
Provides us with the ability to streamline a process model
Pros and Cons
  • "Ease of use and ability to streamline a process model."
  • "Process interfaces between diagrams could be improved."

What is our primary use case?

We are a bank and use this solution for process modeling, organizing, and process architecture like line of business, and to be able to make process interfaces between each diagram. Activities include client enrollment, or a client account opening with a process for loan granting, which can't be done in Modeler. We are customers of Camunda and I'm a process analyst. 

What is most valuable?

The most valuable features are the ease of use and the ability to streamline a process model on a BPM diagram.

What needs improvement?

Process interfaces between diagrams could be improved. I'd like to see process interfaces and structure in order to make process architecture. Not only to lift diagrams, but to make new diagrams and new data. You can make new diagram and new data but if the client wants to open a current account, then it must be a process interface. It would also be helpful if they would publish processes in a format that can be easily viewable and understandable. The main area would be in publishing because we want to have all the processes published on our intranet. 

For how long have I used the solution?

I've been using this solution for six months. 

What do I think about the stability of the solution?

The stability is fine although we did have some initial problems with it. 

What do I think about the scalability of the solution?

The solution is quite scalable and functional. We have seven to 10 users doing process modelling. They're focused on archiving processes.  

How are customer service and technical support?

Technical support is fine, although a little slow. 

How was the initial setup?

The initial setup was very easy, I did it myself. 

What other advice do I have?

As a process analyst, I'm into IT development, so my advice is not to make processes highly detailed. The value added here is the freeware version that can give you the best tool to get the job done as a process analyst. 

I would rate this solution an eight out of 10. 

Which deployment model are you using for this solution?

On-premises
Disclosure: I am a real user, and this review is based on my own experience and opinions.
PeerSpot user
Principal Consultant at Palmira
Real User
Top 20
Stable with support that's good for tracking bugs and has a very good BPMN engine
Pros and Cons
  • "We are using the BPMN engine of Camunda; we are not using the user interface. We are using just the engine, the back end of this. For us, it is working quite well."
  • "The initial setup can be complex for business users."

What is our primary use case?

We are using the product as an OAM that we have included in our software product. We are offering a private cloud solution and we sell it and deploy it to our customers. 

We are using it to create a low-code solution for strategic planning and performance management in order to automate the management processes such as planning, performance management, governance processes, and business process management as a whole.

What is most valuable?

We are using the BPMN engine of Camunda; we are not using the user interface. We are using just the engine, the back end of this. For us, it is working quite well.

The stability of the solution is quite good.

Technical support is good for getting alerts about bugs.

What needs improvement?

The form builder that will be utilized in the system and the data monitor both need improvement at this time. I want to exchange the data between the activity and UI basis. Currently, they are using a JSON file, which needs to be improved. We need something that can be used as a user interface and the user can make the data binding and exchange data between the activities.

This is what we did ourselves. We had the engine itself and we created a data monitor and formed it on top of it. This is what is missing in the system.

The initial setup can be complex for business users.

There occasionally be some bugs in the solution. 

The solution needs to offer more languages such as Chinese, Arabic, Hebrew, et cetera.

What do I think about the stability of the solution?

The system is stable. This is why we selected it. Based on other products, we've found the most appropriate results coming out from the Camunda BPM engine. It's very good.

There are occasionally a few bugs, however, we are quite capable of dealing with them.

What do I think about the scalability of the solution?

Since we are using Camunda as a core solution, a core engine of our system, we are going to continue using it. I'm not willing to change it down the line. There's no plan for us to change it and we are not thinking about changing it. It has all functionalities and we are using about 50% of the engine itself in terms of its capability. We will continue to invest in utilizing all Camunda functionalities in the BPM engine.

How are customer service and support?

In terms of technical support, we are using basic technical support as we are a technical organization. We are a software house. Our team is professional and they have experience in Java and private cloud technology. They are able to fix any issue. 

That said, there are certain bugs in Camunda. They are publishing information about them from time to time. We study the tool very carefully. Support from Camunda doesn't mean too much to us actually, as, in our organization, we have about 380 employees, and the majority of them are Java developers. We take the basic support to track the bugs only.

How would you rate customer service and support?

Positive

Which solution did I use previously and why did I switch?

I also have some experience using Visio as business process management and ARIS as well as Bizagi.

We are partners of Software AG webMethods as an automation tool. We are using Mendix and OutSystems as a low-code solution. ARIS, webMethods, Mendix, and OutSystems are what we mainly use. 

You cannot compare Camunda with ARIS since ARIS is only for our documentation, business process documentation. You cannot compare it with Camunda. It is a totally different scope. However, in comparison between Mendix, OutSystems, and webMethods, they are very expensive tools and ultimately provide the same functionality, yet they are not using a pure BPMN XML. Maybe transferring the workflow between those systems doesn't work. That said, the consistency between, for example, Bonitasoft and Camunda and Bizagi is a matter of import and export. Between other systems such as webMethods and OutSystems and Mendix, for example, in webMethods, they are only still using an enhanced BPM engine mainly, meaning that they are not using the pure or the standard BPM notation. The same applies to Mendix and OutSystems.

How was the initial setup?

The initial setup, for business users, is complex. If you compare it with cloud systems and Mendix, it is complicated. It has a very strong and very rigid back-end BPM engine and it's more trustworthy if XML files have been generated from Camunda. The quality of the XML file being generated from Camunda, the XML files of BPMN, is more trustworthy than other systems. That's why we selected it. This is the main reason that we selected it.

With the Camunda installer, the deployment of just the solution is pretty fast.

However, the automation process with the current functionality, meaning with the missing functionality of data monitor and data binding and with the lack of proper UI representation, it took us a year to develop those components to have a low-code solution on top of it.

Now, with our low-code solution on top, it will take us one to two days to have a visible process automated.

What about the implementation team?

We are an integrator and we are consultants in business process management, and we are developing a tool on top of it. Therefore, we help our clients to implement. However, when we originally installed Camunda, we handled the process ourselves. The way we do things now, we try to make it easier for clients.

What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?

We are using a developer license. I can't speak to exactly how much we are paying, or exactly what license type that we are using. I'm not the technical lead or the solution delivery team. Therefore, I can't answer this question.

Which other solutions did I evaluate?

We did a lot of POCs on available products in the market, such as Bonitasoft, Camunda, Bizagi, so on. However, based on that POCs, we found that the best way to go forward in our solution in terms of the functionality and the accuracy of the XML files. If they could be generated by Camunda it can be more useful for us to adopt in our solution.

What other advice do I have?

We are users of the solution.

We are the latest version due to the fact that we are developing our own product based on Camunda. We are developing a solution based on Camunda. We are a heavy user of Camunda.

Camunda is not so popular in the market due to the UI (meaning the form builder, the way of developing the forms which would be attached to the process), and the data monitor (how to exchange the data between the activities).

A company would need to create an integration framework between Camunda and other systems. If they sold their offering with the UI and data monitor it would be the biggest automation tool ever.

For us, with our experience with using the tool, you need a good developer to be able to use the system effectively. Other than that there are no issues. For an organization that wants to adopt Camunda, they need to have the proper resources, and the proper training to use the system. 

I'd rate the solution at an eight out of ten. There's a bug inside the BPMN monitor that knocks a few points off the rating. If the system is not saved, it will crash.

Which deployment model are you using for this solution?

Private Cloud

If public cloud, private cloud, or hybrid cloud, which cloud provider do you use?

Other
Disclosure: I am a real user, and this review is based on my own experience and opinions.
PeerSpot user
Buyer's Guide
Download our free Camunda Report and get advice and tips from experienced pros sharing their opinions.
Updated: April 2024
Buyer's Guide
Download our free Camunda Report and get advice and tips from experienced pros sharing their opinions.