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ARIS BPA vs BiZZdesign HoriZZon comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Nov 3, 2024

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

ARIS BPA
Ranking in Business Process Design
4th
Average Rating
8.2
Reviews Sentiment
6.8
Number of Reviews
66
Ranking in other categories
Business Process Management (BPM) (9th)
BiZZdesign HoriZZon
Ranking in Business Process Design
11th
Average Rating
7.4
Reviews Sentiment
6.8
Number of Reviews
17
Ranking in other categories
Enterprise Architecture Management (6th)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of April 2025, in the Business Process Design category, the mindshare of ARIS BPA is 7.8%, down from 9.2% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of BiZZdesign HoriZZon is 2.2%, up from 1.9% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Business Process Design
 

Featured Reviews

Libor Černý - PeerSpot reviewer
I can usually find an answer to my issue on ARIS Community
From the start, there were some difficulties on how to create outputs since there wasn't a repository tool in version 6. However, in version 7, there has been a tool for creating standards for a company, and that tool has been very intuitive. While I have been using this tool for several years, other people just starting to use it find the learning curve steep. This tool is very robust and accommodates many roles, where people can participate from compliance, IT designers, etc. This can create problems for users who have no experience with similar tools. It took me a year before I felt comfortable with this tool, because when I came from university it was the first or second tool that I worked on. It took me a year to run every feature or use it for every possibility since this tool is very robust. We sometimes have to create the link to the server and the repository twice because it is deleted once for some unknown reason. Though, this is not a big problem. There should be a more intuitive tool when creating reports.
BijoyTalukder - PeerSpot reviewer
Helps to get a clear overview of our enterprise architecture, especially when dealing with multiple departments
One area where BiZZdesign HoriZZon could use some improvement is in its REST APIs. While the platform offers REST APIs, they have limitations when it comes to retrieving and exporting data. Obtaining detailed information at the individual application or component level, including IDs, costs, and deployment-related data, can be challenging through these APIs. This limitation makes it difficult to smoothly export such granular data. I have raised this issue with the BiZZdesign team, and they expressed interest in addressing it, but I'm not aware of the current status of this improvement effort. Nonetheless, improving the usability and flexibility of the REST APIs for data extraction is an area that could enhance the platform's capabilities.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"​​ARIS process modeling and analysis allows integration of end-to-end business processes with the organization's vision, strategies, and business objectives, through visual management."
"Process Modeling or Process Mapping/Documentation. This is the most comprehensive tool for capturing the process details. Any organization who wants to embark on a BPM journey, process mapping/documentation, lays the foundation for the BPM led implementation."
"It has allowed us to model our enterprise process architecture."
"The EPC modeling is very detailed, the semantic check is helpful, and auto-layout simplifies the formatting."
"MFT is quite attractive. A large amount of data is passed in almost no time and it is quite easy to use."
"The ability to sort via multiple criteria to identify the relationships you need for a specific object."
"The initial setup and installation are very straightforward."
"Features like SAP SolMan sync, Alfabet EA integration (another Software AG product)."
"The powerful editing function in teamwork project-based, common or shared modeling, based on a powerful repository and knowledge sharing in a portal are the most valuable features. These are the most important features for me. I can add the integration of individual modeling notations like Archimate plus BPMN and DMN, and so on. We travel from one location to another and the tool allows us to keep track."
"I used BiZZdesign HoriZZon at two organizations. At Manchester Metropolitan University, I used it with a small team for architectural modeling of the student record system. We modeled teams, process objects, and their interactions with applications. We also used it to model a gradual rollout with plateaus showing migration over time. At the BBC, I used it to model software services for publishing content online. I showed key model views to senior stakeholders using Horizon, allowing them to modify and score applications and services."
"The initial setup of this solution was very straightforward."
"Among the valuable features is the ability to document standards. For example, we have mandatory operating standards that need to be followed by every application and every architecture. We use things like table charts and pie charts for documenting the costs incurred across the systems. All of these are good features."
"This is one of the best tools, especially because of its collaborative nature. Anyone using it can access previous projects and related data. It's definitely a strong collaborative tool."
"The tool's most valuable feature is that its collaboration part is very good."
"BiZZdesign HoriZZon is scalable, and I'd give it an eight out of ten for scalability. Our customers are enterprise level companies, but the solution is suitable for small and mid-sized companies as well."
"One of the main advantages of this solution is that they have representation in the Open Group Forum, which means that any changes in ArchiMate are immediately implemented in BiZZdesign."
 

Cons

"I find it difficult to access the database as I want with direct querying."
"ARIS has an internal fully customizable workflow system called APG, which is very good, but it’s targeted mostly at creating workflows related to ARIS content, and not general workflows to support other processes inside a company."
"Since this is a design tool, seamless interface to make the process flows executable."
"If you want to create new reports then you have to use JavaScript, or ARIS script as they call it, which is beyond the competencies of most people."
"There are reports available in ARIS and you can modify them a bit if you want something more specific, but it's not that easy to adjust them and make modifications. It would be nice to have some kind of tool to do that, something that is more user-friendly for people who are not too technical, so that they could create reports the way they want them."
"In terms of improvement, the app could use some small details and functionalities."
"There is a lot of room for improvement. They need to increase the performance of the system flow. They need to support it more. ARIS Process Governance is still quite basic, and they are using an old BPM and process automation module."
"Integration with third-party tools should be improved (e.g. based on APIs)."
"Integration definitely needs improvement. There are some restrictions. We've seen that it doesn't integrate with everything we might expect."
"We tested it, and we had support from BiZZdesign, including patches, but it just didn't do what we wanted."
"One area where BiZZdesign HoriZZon could use some improvement is in its REST APIs."
"It should be more open to integrating with other existing tools. Although there has been progress in the past."
"There could be simpler modelling."
"The users of BiZZdesign should be able to enter their data or make modeling changes via HoriZZon."
"It lacks capabilities with regard to infrastructure modeling."
"The repository of duplicate objects is bad."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The price of the solution is reasonable."
"It is an expensive solution."
"This is absolutely not the cheapest solution in the market, but for large companies, the price is fine."
"From my point of view, no, it is not cheap, but it is not too expensive because you get this big organization behind it, technical support, and all those things. It's not so expensive to use. It's a Rolls Royce in this field, I know that. Even for small organizations, they can get so much effect from using this tool, in a very fast way, so the money will be back in the customer's pocket very fast."
"Prices are high. However, they are worth it if the organization utilizes the tool to its full potential."
"ARIS Express​ is free."
"The price could be better."
"Their license model is really difficult to understand, and licenses are quite expensive."
"We were customers and bought licenses from them. We used their remote instance initially but upgraded to the on-device version due to lag. For pricing, we paid about 2200 pounds a year per seat for the client installation at an educational rate. I'm not sure about commercial rates. I managed to get a free copy at BBC since it was for evaluation purposes."
"First and foremost within the scope of improvement for the solution would be the cost. It's very costly..."
"I haven't found any issues with the scalability and licensing parts that are access-related."
"The pricing model is slightly on the high side and could be more competitive for long-term partnerships."
"In terms of this particular product usage, my clients currently only use per-user licenses."
"The price is reasonable."
"If one is very cheap and ten is expensive, I rate the product price as a seven out of ten."
"[The] Orbus... pricing model was based on every single functionality having a price. The pricing was comparable but if we wanted to scale, it would have ended up being a lot more expensive. BiZZdesign gave us one price with all of the functionality, and we could scale as much as we needed."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
18%
Computer Software Company
12%
Manufacturing Company
11%
Government
8%
Educational Organization
30%
Financial Services Firm
17%
Manufacturing Company
7%
Government
6%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about ARIS BPA?
The most valuable features of ARIS BPA are its flexibility and reporting.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for ARIS BPA?
Pricing for ARIS BPA is average, not cheap or expensive. It's cost-effective and worth the money we pay.
What needs improvement with ARIS BPA?
I find it difficult to access the database as I want with direct querying. I must write scripts, which requires specific knowledge. Software AG could improve this by making the database more open. ...
What do you like most about BiZZdesign HoriZZon?
This is one of the best tools, especially because of its collaborative nature. Anyone using it can access previous projects and related data. It's definitely a strong collaborative tool.
What needs improvement with BiZZdesign HoriZZon?
The ability to generate charts and deal with a use case involving Kibana was quite difficult. We don't use the chart functionality much, and I think that is quite problematic at the moment. We have...
What is your primary use case for BiZZdesign HoriZZon?
I use the solution in my company for all sorts of things, like enterprise and solution architecture. As part of our design process, BiZZdesign HoriZZon is used for road mapping. We also use it for ...
 

Also Known As

ARIS, ARIS BPM
HoriZZon
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Tesco, Weifu, Airbus, Siemens, Proximus, Alicorp, Sekerbank, Bancor, Philips,Sky, Emirates NBD, Dubai Municipality, Suva, U.S. Army, Australia Post, Westfalen Weser Energie - ARIS serves customers across all industries and of every size worldwide. Companies trust ARIS as the market leader for process excellence with more than 30 years of experience in the market, 10 million users worldwide, from 1 user companies to the Fortune 500.
T-Mobile, Shell, HSBC, Erasmus University, VIVAT Insurance
Find out what your peers are saying about ARIS BPA vs. BiZZdesign HoriZZon and other solutions. Updated: March 2025.
845,040 professionals have used our research since 2012.