IBM Engineering Lifecycle Management (ELM) vs OpenText Software Delivery Management comparison

IBM and OpenText are both solutions in the Application Lifecycle Management (ALM) Suites category. IBM is ranked #12 with an average rating of 7.5, while OpenText is ranked #7 with an average rating of 8.3. IBM holds a 3.8% mindshare in ALM, compared to OpenText’s 5.8% mindshare. Additionally, 76% of IBM users are willing to recommend the solution, compared to 92% of OpenText users who would recommend it.

IBM Engineering Lifecycle M...

Read 19 IBM Engineering Lifecycle Management (ELM) reviews

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1,475 Comparison Views

76% willing to recommend

OpenText Software Delivery ...

Read 41 OpenText Software Delivery Management reviews

3,651 Views
3,505 Comparison Views

92% willing to recommend

IBM Engineering Lifecycle M...

OpenText Software Delivery ...

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Executive SummaryUpdated on Jun 19, 2025

IBM Engineering Lifecycle Management and OpenText Software Delivery Management compete in project lifecycle management. ELM holds an edge in integration capabilities, while OpenText is noted for its flexible deployment options, aligning with cloud strategies.

Features: ELM excels in tool integration and traceability features, enhancing streamlined workflows. It offers strong collaboration, allowing requirement, development, and testing lifecycle traceability. OpenText enhances team collaboration via real-time analytics and supports Agile management with customizable Kanban components and workflow tools.

Room for Improvement: ELM could improve on simplifying its deployment process and slightly enhancing collaboration features. There may also be a need for more customizable analytics to aid smaller teams. OpenText could benefit from expanding its integration capabilities and enhancing its traceability of project metrics. Improving support for on-premise deployments and refining its Agile management tools could also be beneficial.

Ease of Deployment and Customer Service: OpenText Software Delivery Management provides a cloud-based deployment model, facilitating scalability and straightforward updates. ELM's on-premise setup is more complex but is supported by reliable customer service, offering assistance during the deployment process. OpenText’s cloud-first approach contrasts with ELM’s traditional methods.

Pricing and ROI: ELM features a higher initial setup cost due to its extensive features, yet promises long-term ROI through effective project management. OpenText poses a more economical upfront cost with flexible pricing, attractive for smaller organizations seeking steady returns on investment.

To learn more, read our detailed IBM Engineering Lifecycle Management (ELM) vs. OpenText Software Delivery Management Report (Updated: July 2025).

Buyer's Guide

IBM Engineering Lifecycle Management (ELM) vs. OpenText Software Delivery Management

July 2025

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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

IBM Engineering Lifecycle M...

Ranking in Application Lifecycle Management (ALM) Suites

12th

Average Rating

7.2

Reviews Sentiment

6.2

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

No ranking in other categories

OpenText Software Delivery ...

Ranking in Application Lifecycle Management (ALM) Suites

7th

Average Rating

8.2

Reviews Sentiment

7.0

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

Enterprise Agile Planning Tools (7th)

Mindshare comparison

As of August 2025, in the Application Lifecycle Management (ALM) Suites category, the mindshare of IBM Engineering Lifecycle Management (ELM) is 3.8%, up from 2.1% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of OpenText Software Delivery Management is 5.8%, up from 5.5% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.

Application Lifecycle Management (ALM) Suites

Featured Reviews

Juergen Albrecht

Managing Director at CCC Systems Engineering Suisse GmbH

Combining tools for effective data analysis while customization and integration need improvement

The most valuable feature is how IBM Engineering Lifecycle Management (ELM) allows me to present to the customer what the actual software, even hardware, will do. It helps them gain an impression of the complexity of the functionality and find an easier way to decide whether to implement it. A picture says more than one thousand words, which is why I work with the combination of ELM and the specification of DOORS. The automation capabilities I built use column-based scripts for analysis to search, fetch, and transfer information. When I open modules, it automatically analyzes the changes since the last opening by me.

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GeorgNauerz

Managing Partner at Georg Nauerz Consulting

A stable tool for sprint planning, test management, quality management, and automated testing

I think the area of release management in the tool is an area of concern where improvements are required. In general, the connection between releases and scrum teams needs improvement, as it could be optimized owing to its linkages, making it very uncomfortable as soon as you have strong teams or scrum teams that work with different items over several releases. In future product releases, the solution needs to focus a bit more on the metric part. The product's dashboard is a metric for productivity and process control.

Read full review

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"It helped us contain critical things, like source code and several documents, which is very important to us."

"The integration with Git works well."

"The planning feature is rich with Scrum concepts: Sprint, Sprint retrospective, the rules in the Scrum framework."

"The tools for requirement capture we have found very useful."

"The word emulation and importing is good."

"We have something called the GC (global configuration), which is a unique feature compared to any other competitor we have in the ALM space."

"At the same time, if you're working from the architect or the designing team you, it's quite easy to manage the resources online."

"One of the key advantages of IBM Rational ALM is its workflow capabilities, which enable seamless collaboration between development and production teams and ensure that all stakeholders are aware of the progress and readiness of the solution. Additionally, the solution is good for integration."

More IBM Engineering Lifecycle Management (ELM) pros

"The integration points are very good. Octane gives us a window not only into our manual testing, but also our automation testing and our performance testing. We can see all results from all three streams of testing in one place."

"Octane creates a gentle approach to Agile-based projects."

"We are seeing some real improvements in the way we do things. We are becoming more agile in the way we do it because of that and in a way that stories are managed. Stories are given lifecycles as opposed to just being entities within a tool."

"Octane works well with the Jira portfolio to track the project with two methods: Agile and Waterfall. We can track all the testing in Waterfall or Agile and synchronize it with Agile tools."

"The most important feature is the integration among all the different features in just one tool: Agile management system, requirements management system, test management, defects management, automatic test execution. Really, if you're looking at other tools, you will never find all that integrated into just one tool with all the traceability, with all the elements in just one place."

"Backlog management is the most valuable feature. This was a capability that was missing or difficult to achieve in ALM Quality Center."

"It is a very stable solution. Stability-wise, I rate the solution a ten out of ten."

"It's more streamlined because we have it all under one umbrella. And once the business requirements and rules have been created, we can do test cases and apply them to the business rules."

More OpenText Software Delivery Management pros

Cons

"One of the complaints from users is that they have to click buttons too many times for just a simple task. Changing this would lead to a better user experience."

"The interconnectivity between packages is a major support problem and can be improved."

"Of course it would be related to customer experience. The solution is not user friendly at all. It needs an expert to use it, although the reporting feature was okay."

"Some improvements to the user interface (UI) would be helpful, such as exposing more services to make it easier to customize to the needs of each customer."

"Improvement is needed in bridging DNG and Rhapsody and vice versa for better data exchange from both sides with some trigger technologies."

"The stability of IBM Rational ALM could be improved."

"The GUI is a little bit outdated."

"The features should be more intuitive. If I'm looking for something, its location should be easy to locate."

More IBM Engineering Lifecycle Management (ELM) cons

"Documentation is not clear."

"The reporting needs to be improved and allow for customization. I want to build my own widgets, but I don't want to use the ones already in the system. I want to build mine from scratch."

"I have yet to experience the CI/CD part of Micro Focus ALM Octane but as demonstrated by the team who is providing the services, I see that the CI/CD could improve. When we check in the code, for the code snippet that has been checked in by a particular user, you need to open a separate file. When comparing Micro Focus ALM Octane to Jira, they have a separate window in which you can click on the ID and the code is visible in the snippet. It's a two-step process in Micro Focus ALM Octane and it's a single-step process in Jira. It's essential for the developers to think about this difference."

"Improvements could be made by way of additional integrations across the lifecycle."

"They don't support all IDEs yet. We have Visual Studio code, which is not supported, and loved by our developers. This integration is missing. We also had to do our own in-house integration with the Confluence. That is also something that they could add."

"I like their smart analytics; perhaps they should continue to expand and improve there because it's a fantastic start."

"There's a trend in our requests to have the ability to export data, en masse, out of Octane. There are capabilities within Octane to export data, but there are specifics around test suites and requirements and relations, as well as certain attributes, that we would like to be able to export easily out of Octane and into a database or Excel."

"It could use just some small improvements. I would like additional features, like planning features, user story mapping, or connection to collaboration tools."

More OpenText Software Delivery Management cons

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The price of the solution could be reduced. Many of our customers are not using all the features and this could be why our clients feel the price is too high."

"The solution is not cheap."

"IBM Rational ALM has both monthly and yearly licensing options."

"We have a contract, but I am not aware of the details."

"This product is a little expensive and we had to pay extra to have them set it up for us."

"For what it does, it's very reasonably priced. I like the licensing model as well, because it's very flexible. You can scale licenses up and down for short periods of time."

"I rate the product price an eight on a scale of one to ten, where one is cheap, and ten is expensive. The product is neither cheap nor expensive."

"I rate the tool's pricing an eight on a scale from one to ten, where ten is very expensive."

"The price of Micro Focus ALM Octane is too high compared to other solutions."

"The cost of this product is very high."

"Microsoft is a big challenge for Micro Focus when it comes to pricing because they are much cheaper. But it definitely depends on the complexity of the environment. If it has multiple technologies, at that point, looking at other options and Microsoft would be a feasible approach."

"The comparison is always with Jira, so the pricing of Octane is a bit on the higher side. But if you look at what you have to add to Jira, on the plug-in side, to have the same abilities you have with Octane, you're more or less even, or even ahead with Octane."

"If you compare the price with the functionality, it is pretty much the same as other solutions. If you compare it to Jira, for instance, it has a lot more functionality. You don't need any plug-ins, but it's also more expensive. Once you start adding your different plug-ins to Jira, you'll probably end up with the same amount or more. There is also a yearly support cost, which is usually 25% of the initial cost of the license."

More OpenText Software Delivery Management pricing and cost advice

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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Manufacturing Company

24%

Computer Software Company

14%

Government

12%

Transportation Company

Financial Services Firm

24%

Manufacturing Company

11%

Computer Software Company

10%

Government

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about IBM Rational ALM?

The solution is customizable.

See all answers

What needs improvement with IBM Rational ALM?

Improvement is needed in bridging DNG and Rhapsody and vice versa for better data exchange from both sides with some trigger technologies. This would provide a visual reminder of changes in a modul...

See all answers

What is your primary use case for IBM Rational ALM?

Most of my primary use cases involve the combination of IBM Engineering Lifecycle Management (ELM) ( /products/ibm-engineering-lifecycle-management-elm-reviews ) and DOORS, including both Classic D...

See all answers

Is Jira better or would you go with Micro Focus ALM Octane?

Hi Netanya, Basically , it all depends on the use cases for your environment and the business needs. Hope the below data may be relevant to you for identifying your needs and deciding on the approp...

See all answers

What do you like most about Micro Focus ALM Octane?

The platform's most valuable feature is pipeline integration or continuous integration services.

See all answers

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Micro Focus ALM Octane?

OpenText ALM Octane is an expensive product. However, it offsets costs by saving time and money, thus creating a balance between expenses and benefits. Our organization with over 1500 users sees sa...

See all answers

Comparisons

Jira vs IBM Engineering Lifecycle Management (ELM)

Compared 25% of the time

Codebeamer vs IBM Engineering Lifecycle Management (ELM)

Compared 18% of the time

Microsoft Azure DevOps vs IBM Engineering Lifecycle Management (ELM)

Compared 16% of the time

Polarion ALM vs IBM Engineering Lifecycle Management (ELM)

Compared 10% of the time

More IBM Engineering Lifecycle Management (ELM) Competitors

Jira vs OpenText Software Delivery Management

Compared 43% of the time

OpenText Application Quality Management vs OpenText Software Delivery Management

Compared 27% of the time

Microsoft Azure DevOps vs OpenText Software Delivery Management

Compared 8% of the time

Rally Software vs OpenText Software Delivery Management

Compared 4% of the time

Codebeamer vs OpenText Software Delivery Management

Compared 2% of the time

More OpenText Software Delivery Management Competitors

Product Reports

Buyer's Guide

IBM Engineering Lifecycle Management (ELM)

August 2025

IBM Engineering Lifecycle Management (ELM) report

Download IBM Engineering Lifecycle Management (ELM) product report

Buyer's Guide

OpenText Software Delivery Management

August 2025

OpenText Software Delivery Management report

Download OpenText Software Delivery Management product report

Also Known As

IBM Engineering Rhapsody, Rational ALM, MKS

Micro Focus ALM Octane, Micro Focus Octane

Overview

IBM Engineering Lifecycle Management stands out for its robust Agile Scrum planning, lifecycle traceability, and tool management, offering cloud-based configurability and strong collaboration features.

IBM Engineering Lifecycle Management provides rich capabilities for Agile project management, facilitating requirements and test management, configuration management, and version control. Its integration with IBM Doors supports comprehensive requirements handling, and the cloud-based platform enhances collaborative efficiency across teams. Despite needing advances in user-friendliness and reporting, ELM's global configuration and compliance features make it invaluable in demanding environments.

What are the key features of IBM Engineering Lifecycle Management?

Scrum-based planning: Supports Agile methodologies with rich planning tools.
Lifecycle traceability: Offers complete traceability across development stages.
Customizable workflows: Adaptable workflows with Kanban for flexibility.
Git integration: Supports efficient version control and collaboration.
Global Configuration: Manages complex configurations globally.
Compliance and reporting: Ensures robust auditing and comprehensive reporting capabilities.

What benefits should be evaluated in reviews?

Collaboration: Enhanced sharing across platforms for seamless teamwork.
Cost-effectiveness: Delivers efficient tools that optimize project spend.
Comprehensive requirement handling: Facilitates detailed requirement management through IBM Doors integration.

IBM Engineering Lifecycle Management is vital in sectors like automotive and manufacturing, where it implements Agile frameworks to manage requirements, conduct testing, and handle defects. It integrates into development pipelines ensuring live traceability and visibility, supporting critical engineering processes efficiently.

IBM

OpenText Software Delivery Management provides application lifecycle management with Agile and Waterfall support. It features intuitive interfaces, CI/CD integration, automated testing, and robust reporting, improving project management efficiency and usability.

Designed to enhance teams' productivity and streamline processes, OpenText Software Delivery Management integrates seamlessly with Agile methodologies. Its comprehensive backlog and requirements management, user stories, and test management make it a complete tool for managing the development lifecycle. The platform aligns with DevOps, providing traceability and extensive customization options. Traceability from requirements to deployments is enhanced, making it easier for teams to track progress. It offers integration with popular tools like Jenkins and JIRA, ensuring a unified approach to continuous delivery and testing management.

What key features does OpenText Software Delivery Management include?

Versatile across browsers with consistent performance.
Seamless CI/CD integration for smooth development processes.
Intuitive interface aiding in efficiency and ease of use.
Comprehensive backlog management ensures organized prioritization.
Automated testing aligns with Agile and DevOps principles.

What benefits can users expect when evaluating OpenText Software Delivery Management?

Enhanced traceability from inception to delivery.
Improved project management efficiency through streamlined processes.
Robust reporting capabilities offering detailed insights.
Increased flexibility in customization enabling tailored experiences.
Predictive analytics for better decision-making.

OpenText Software Delivery Management is implemented across technology-focused industries, supporting Agile processes like requirements management and defect tracking. Organizations use it to standardize development workflows and optimize continuous delivery integration, choosing it for its ability to support both Agile and Waterfall methodologies within application lifecycle management.

OpenText

Sample Customers

Tennis Australia, WeCloud AB, Port Otago Limited, Logicalis US, Valmer, The Chevrolet Volt, Ashurst

Orange, Airbus, Haufe Group, Kellogg's, Claro, Bon Secours, World Wide Technology

Buyer's Guide

IBM Engineering Lifecycle Management (ELM) vs. OpenText Software Delivery Management

July 2025

Free Report: IBM Engineering Lifecycle Management (ELM) vs. OpenText Software Delivery Management

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