Blue Prism vs VisualCron comparison

SS&C Blue Prism and NetCart AB are both solutions in the Robotic Process Automation (RPA) category. SS&C Blue Prism is ranked #4 with an average rating of 8.4, while NetCart AB is ranked #17 with an average rating of 8.5. SS&C Blue Prism holds a 9.4% mindshare in RPA, compared to NetCart AB’s 0.9% mindshare. Additionally, 88% of SS&C Blue Prism users are willing to recommend the solution, compared to 100% of NetCart AB users who would recommend it.

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Executive SummaryUpdated on Dec 4, 2024

Blue Prism and VisualCron are competing solutions in the field of process automation and scheduling tools. Blue Prism appears to have an advantage in automation capabilities with robust work queues, whereas VisualCron stands out in job scheduling efficiencies.

Features: Blue Prism provides advanced automation options with reusable processes, a robust work queue, and easy integration with existing systems. VisualCron specializes in job scheduling, job dependencies, and seamless connections with varied databases.

Room for Improvement: Blue Prism needs enhanced AI capabilities, wider integration options, and improved customer support. Its interface, especially in attended automation and OCR, could be modernized. VisualCron could benefit from a more streamlined user interface, better technical documentation, and faster customer support, possibly through a community forum.

Ease of Deployment and Customer Service: Blue Prism offers multiple deployment options but faces criticism for slow customer support, impacting users' experience. VisualCron, available on similar platforms, is noted for straightforward licensing but relies heavily on community interactions for customer service.

Pricing and ROI: Blue Prism is often criticized for high costs, though some justify this with significant ROI. VisualCron provides a more competitive and simple licensing model, enhancing cost-efficiency for simpler job scheduling needs.

To learn more, read our detailed Blue Prism vs. VisualCron Report (Updated: June 2025).

Buyer's Guide

Blue Prism vs. VisualCron

June 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

Automate

Mindshare comparison

As of June 2025, in the Robotic Process Automation (RPA) category, the mindshare of Automate is 1.7%, up from 1.0% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Blue Prism is 9.4%, down from 12.3% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of VisualCron is 0.9%, up from 0.5% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.

Robotic Process Automation (RPA)

Featured Reviews

Anabel Marco

Account Director at a tech services company with 11-50 employees

Automates processes efficiently with cost-effective scaling and robust customer support

Web scraping is quite good since it offers a lot of possibilities. Another important feature for me is its compatibility with MBI, the Power that is ISEQUADO Centers. I appreciate the ability to scale and increase the number of bots or studios without additional expense. Automate's non-reliance on additional orchestrators makes it quite cost-effective.

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WayneFillis

Robotic Process Automation Manager at South African Reserve Bank

Effective automation boosts efficiency but requires improved co-management

There is a need for a co-management product to manage multiple developers using Blue Prism. Features like version control and supporting multiple developers at the same time should be improved. Furthermore, Blue Prism should invest in marketing their other products. I also find it concerning that they require purchasing support calls.

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Sourav-Dutta

Technical Lead - Database Administrator at SMART ENERGY SYSTEMS LLC

It's user-friendly, and I didn't need long to understand the process

We use VisualCron for all our automation needs, like connecting to FileZilla, calling APIs, generating PGP keys, creating encryption files with the PGP key login to Azure, etc. It can automatically log in to SQL Server and execute SQL script jobs in bulk. We had 2,000-3,000 users at my previous…

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Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"Compared to other vendors, it's the scheduling tool because a lot of vendors want to charge you extra for their enterprise-level license to have a scheduling tool built in to give you the ability to set up regular schedules to run and do certain data checks."

"I like the interface; it makes managing automation easy. We can set different schedules and templates for each task."

"The most valuable feature is the drag-and-drop interface, which is very Windows-like."

"The best feature of Automate is its ease of use, which is a major selling point."

"Fortra's Automate performs the job effectively and has the capability to alert us of any issues."

"Overall, the whole product is really nice and provides significant benefits."

"I would rate the technical support as a nine out of ten because it is quite fast and courteous."

"We are still in the process of rolling it to production and tweaking it (our AD groups are a mess), but the improvements are priceless. Having users ID's created the same way every time without human error is the best part. We don't need to worry about why groups were not added, user rights not set to folders or missing a private folder being created, typos or just even knowing when things are done and logged."

More Automate pros

"We found the unassisted bots very useful because they can program a variety of different processes. This is a valuable feature of Blue Prism, especially when compared to other tools on the market."

"It is a stable solution."

"The ease of development is the most valuable. Standard VBOs are pretty useful there with Excel and different things. Our custom developments for SAP and things like that are pretty easy to set up and quick to get going."

"Although the solution may look complicated it actually has a lot of features and user space to work out of."

"Blue Prism currently supports SQL Servers and structured data."

"Blue Prism is a great enterprise and it has offered the solutions that I have been needing in order to give my organization an RPA."

"The only feature that stands out in Blue Prism, as compared to other tools, is security. This is the only reason for still having Blue Prism in our bucket. It is very secure and reliable, and it has also been in the market for a very long time. We automated a lot of federal and government automation processes very recently with this solution."

"We started with a very small team and small projects. As the project started getting success with Blue Prism we have a large number of teams now just for automating all the business procedures. Larger time was saved after automating the processes."

More Blue Prism pros

"We don't have to do any coding. We just plug and play and it works."

"The most valuable feature of VisualCron is its ability to schedule interactive jobs so that you can have interdependencies within the job and interdependencies of a job on another job, and so on."

"It has improved our organization with more automation within the business departments and less administration and development in the IT department. Usually, as the IT department, we are the bottleneck for many requirements within the business. With this tool, the business departments are able to perform many task themselves."

"What I like about VisualCron is that like its name, it's a very visual tool. In my previous company, there were a lot of scripts for all kinds of services, and through VisualCron, you get to group all flows and get a nice visual overview. VisualCron also has an alerting feature, so you receive alerts from it. VisualCron makes everything clearer and easier to maintain. Every other solution that I was looking for almost always needed a programmer, but with VisualCron, you can do what you need to do without programming skills, so this is another valuable feature of the tool."

"What I found most beneficial from VisualCron is that you can directly connect it with different databases, user accounts, and credentials. You can run queries from one machine to another using the credentials, unlike PowerShell, that's run by the machine itself. With VisualCron, you can directly ask other machines and run requests through user credentials. Suppose you have an AWS or Azure environment. In that case, you can maintain the connection between on-premises and cloud-based machines, which is the type of setup in the organization I'm working for. You can directly call some of the services via VisualCron on your local on-premises machine, and I found that an excellent feature of the tool."

"It helped us reduce manual steps."

"'ve only had a few cases where I've had to request support in the past 12 years of use, but the support response time and resolution were was extremely quick."

"The tool has reduced our operational costs by 40%."

More VisualCron pros

Cons

"Some challenges include the system being too loaded or delayed in taking instructions and responding quickly as needed."

"We really need a free development environment for customers. Building and testing automation on production isn't ideal."

"I currently have three bugs open with them that I don't know if they are addressed in the new release."

"Some companies have asked for voice integration. This is likely part of the roadmap."

"The documentation is not that great."

"The product also has a limited use case in some respects."

"I believe we need to test various OCR tools that assist in evaluating, let's say, six different customer resyncs. We analyze their spending patterns and documentations, but current OCR support has limitations, requiring highly standardized documents, which isn't always the case. With a more advanced OCR system, we could improve processes related to credit risk management and legal matters. We're exploring how to integrate Fortra's Automate with our CRM platform, taking cues from instances where Salesforce seamlessly merged with Automate. However, we use a different CRM, Insight for New Enterprise, and we're seeking ways to connect the automation process within our CRM. We aim for the automation to continue smoothly, even in instances where traditional automation methods might face hurdles."

"I find that most important features are strong, however, there is a lack of good development for artificial intelligence, such as machine learning."

More Automate cons

"They can add a reporting feature."

"The recording of the transaction is missing in this solution."

"I have been speaking directly with Blue Prism's engagement manager about making the solution more web-based. It's not quite there yet. Currently, the latest version is still under the beta version, so, as a customer, we don't have access to it. They are making it much more web-based, but for now, everything you have to log into requires an enterprise server — It's still more client-based than web-based."

"Our primary challenge at present is that we are finding it difficult to get additional business insights into existing processes so that we can identify where we need to improve."

"We would like to see intelligent process automation that integrates RPA and machine learning."

"The assisted automation functionality needs improvement."

"We had a lot of challenges managing authentication and reusing or using external authentication providers."

"Blue Prism could improve by having better integration with Computer Vision."

More Blue Prism cons

"I want to improve the UI in VisualCron, as it's not as user-friendly, particularly when setting up the task scheduler. If you're familiar with the tool, then no problem, but if not, you'll have a problem typing text because sometimes, the cursor points to other places, so there's an issue with text box alignment in VisualCron. That was painful for me when I was just a VisualCron novice, but when you become used to it, there won't be a problem."

"VisualCron is software, and you will experience performance degradation when you scale up. VisualCron takes too much memory or CPU power. We have to increase the hardware resources of a specific server or system."

"The error timeout and info could be better. When making web request calls, it will time out sometimes and we won't get any useful info out of the error response."

"Our suggestion to make it better and more manageable in terms of GDPR: Implement it in a very partnership way."

"There are some conditions in the mail trigger, but you can only use them as an "AND" condition, not as an "OR" condition. This is an improvement that could be useful. For example, some people put "invoice" in the subject and others put "invoice" in the body. If I want to make a trigger for everybody whose sending invoices, I have to make two jobs for this now."

"The documentation is a bit weak."

"The only problem I face when I use the tool is that it doesn't contain much documentation or it doesn't have many video tutorials on its features."

"VisualCron's command console is a little bit difficult to understand and needs to improve."

More VisualCron cons

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The cost is a bit high for a small business like ours, but we manage with Fortra's Automate."

"It comes with a package that costs approximately $20,000 USD per year."

"From a distributor's side, one of the biggest selling points is its price point. Without going into any numbers, compared to UiPath, Automation Anywhere, and Blue Prism, we're significantly cheaper. The main difference is that other competitors usually charge you per process. However, in Automate's case, it's priced per bot. So, a bot can run multiple processes at the same time, but you are only priced for a single bot."

"The pricing is quite reasonable. We can run the process with one bot. The limitation is at the server level because they have some resources, and sometimes that is enough. It isn't too expensive, so you can get a good return off of one, and you can also have a pack of five bots that is quite competitive."

"Compared to other products, the pricing model for this solution is much more convenient, flexible, and adaptable to the Portuguese reality."

"While solutions like UiPath and Blue Prism cost around $11,000-$12,000 for each license, this product costs around $7,000 and you can keep it forever."

"I believe the price falls within a reasonable range, which significantly influenced our decision regarding the product. This aspect is crucial for any technological solution, especially in our country where enterprises might be hesitant to invest heavily in something untested or uncertain about its practicality and potential returns."

"It has gone up in price. The price of Fortra's Automate has increased since we first started using it. It does a lot but also costs a lot. It was a lot more affordable before Fortra owned the software."

More Automate pricing and cost advice

"Other than your infrastructure, in terms of servers that you have to set up, I don't think that there are any costs in addition to the standard licensing fees."

"Its price should be lower."

"The solution is enterprise software so we will try to maximize our usage during the available slots. We will get ROI with the high price since there will be some value added with automation. I think that after doing a cost-benefit analysis, we are on the positive side."

"The licensing is approximately $1,100."

"This is a very expensive product and this is the reason that they're losing their market share."

"I chose Blue Prism because it is priced well. The pricing was right for me at that moment even though Automation Anywhere is better in other aspects."

"They work on a big partnership kind of program with our organization, and they also give us a lot of discounts. Its price is pretty much comparable to the other solutions like UiPath and Automation Anywhere."

"Blue Prism has a really simple licensing model, where the licenses are not confusing and there are no hidden costs the way there are in UiPath."

More Blue Prism pricing and cost advice

"ROI is 95 percent."

"The price is a bit high."

"ROI is one month."

"VisualCron is correctly priced because it wasn't very cheap, and it wasn't overly expensive, so the price for it was set correctly. When my previous company bought VisualCron, it was €800 per server per year. On a scale of one to five, I would rate the pricing for VisualCron a five because it was just right. The tool was affordable, and it has one of the most competitive pricing in the market."

"We are fine with a rather cheap setup. Licensing with VisualCron is fair. You have a simple one-year licence in different sizes. There isn't a licensing jungle with hundreds of options and opt-ins."

"The pricing is extremely fair, and because of that I recommend purchasing multiple instances to split out the processing load across multiple application servers."

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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Financial Services Firm

14%

Computer Software Company

12%

Manufacturing Company

Educational Organization

Financial Services Firm

21%

Computer Software Company

11%

Manufacturing Company

Government

Computer Software Company

28%

Financial Services Firm

14%

Insurance Company

Healthcare Company

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about HelpSystems AutoMate?

We use it for specific cases, mainly secure file transfers, which are vital for us. And it works for us.

See all answers

What is your primary use case for HelpSystems AutoMate?

I am a consultant and I am making a lot of processes in human resources, payroll, certifications, trainings, web scra...

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What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Fortra Automate?

The pricing is quite good compared to its competitors. Competitors are often more expensive than Automate. I would ra...

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Should I choose Blue Prism or Microsoft Power Automate?

Hello Netanya, it depends on your needs and your expertise. In my humble opinion you can start a big RPA project imp...

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I am evaluating Blue Prism and UiPath for RPA for my company. Which one do you recommend?

I'm very familiar with UiPath and the RPA industry: was hired by Daniel Dines in 2015 when there were 35 employees an...

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What do you like most about Blue Prism?

It is a stable solution.

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What do you like most about VisualCron?

The tool has reduced our operational costs by 40%.

See all answers

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for VisualCron?

The price is a bit high. However, it is okay.

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What needs improvement with VisualCron?

The documentation is a bit weak. The tool must provide a better set of documentation.

See all answers

Comparisons

Microsoft Power Automate vs Automate

Compared 34% of the time

UiPath Platform vs Automate

Compared 33% of the time

Automation Anywhere vs Automate

Compared 8% of the time

MOVEit vs Automate

Compared 5% of the time

Control-M vs Automate

Compared 4% of the time

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Microsoft Power Automate vs Blue Prism

Compared 36% of the time

UiPath Platform vs Blue Prism

Compared 30% of the time

Automation Anywhere vs Blue Prism

Compared 12% of the time

Pega Robotic Process Automation vs Blue Prism

Compared 4% of the time

Appian RPA vs Blue Prism

Compared 1% of the time

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Microsoft Power Automate vs VisualCron

Compared 41% of the time

Control-M vs VisualCron

Compared 19% of the time

OpCon vs VisualCron

Compared 8% of the time

ActiveBatch by Redwood vs VisualCron

Compared 7% of the time

JAMS vs VisualCron

Compared 5% of the time

More VisualCron Competitors

Product Reports

Buyer's Guide

Automate

June 2025

Download Automate product report

Buyer's Guide

Blue Prism

June 2025

Download Blue Prism product report

Buyer's Guide

VisualCron

May 2025

Download VisualCron product report

Also Known As

HelpSystems Automate, Automate

No data available

Overview

Automate offers a user-friendly solution with a drag-and-drop interface for efficient task automation and integration with major platforms like SAP and Azure, making it ideal for quick deployment with minimal coding and training.

Automate provides powerful features for businesses seeking efficient automation, offering compatibility with databases, email integration, and cloud platforms. Its simple interface supports both beginners and experienced users, simplifying tasks like invoice processing, HR automation, and data transformation. Cost-effective pricing and flexible licensing enhance its appeal while integration capabilities and scheduling tools ensure smooth workflow automation.

What are Automate's Key Features?

Drag-and-Drop Interface: Simplifies automation with intuitive design.
Integration Capabilities: Connects with platforms like SAP and Azure for seamless data flow.
Database and FTP Triggers: Enhances automation potential through direct data interaction.
Efficient Scheduling: Automates tasks with precise timing and control.
Web Scraping: Automates data extraction for quick analysis and reporting.

What Benefits and ROI Should Users Expect?

Rapid Deployment: Minimizes coding efforts for quick implementation.
Cost-Effectiveness: Offers flexible pricing models to suit budget constraints.
Operational Efficiency: Reduces manual workloads and enhances productivity.
Comprehensive Integration: Facilitates improved data management across systems.
Scalability: Adapts to growing business needs with ease.

In industries such as healthcare, banking, and logistics, Automate is used for tasks like invoice payment automation, data transformation, and task automation. This leads to streamlined processes and reduced manual workload, illustrating its value in enhancing operational efficiency through diversified workflows.

Fortra

Blue Prism is an intelligent, business-developed, no-code automation platform for SaaS deployments as well as for on-premises, public cloud, multi-cloud, and hybrid environments. Unlike other automation technology, Blue Prism combines robotic process automation with expanded artificial intelligence and cognitive capabilities. Blue Prism gives users instant access to the tools you need for building and delegating automations, as well as a digital workforce that is already AI-equipped.

With Blue Prism’s code-free RPA, deployed through use of their Robotic Operating Model, your business can scale efficiently, improve customer satisfaction, reduce costs, and augment its talent to take on new responsibilities. Blue Prism helps to accelerate operational agility and efficiency by making it easy to automate the most important processes. Allocating everyday tasks to your Digital Workforce gives you immediate increased capacity and allows your teams to focus on their strategic goals. In addition, it delivers a return on investment, increases efficiency gains, and can even introduce new revenue streams.

“Workforce of the Future”

Blue Prism’s all-in-one intelligent automation platform consists of:

Design Studio with drag-and-drop process automation building, reusable “objects” across your business, and updates to objects and processes saved throughout the process library.
Control Room where you can assign processes to digital workers, scale digital worker and task volume ondemand, and gain real-time transparency of process proficiencies.
Digital Workforce of autonomous software robots that can learn and mimic business processes like humans and are equipped with six intelligent automation skills:
1. Knowledge and Insight - The ability to harvest, understand, and deliver insights from multiple disparate data sources.
2. Visual Perception - The ability to read, understand, and contextualize visual information.
3. Learning - The ability to derive contextual meaning and adapt to evolving process patterns.
4. Planning and Sequencing - The ability to optimize workloads and identify opportunities for better outcomes.
5. Problem-solving - The ability to autonomously solve system, logic, and business problems.
6. Collaboration - The ability to seamlessly work with both people and systems.

Reviews from Real Users

Blue Prism stands out for its enterprise-level functionality, which is why many companies choose it over its competitors. PeerSpot users note that the solution is easy to use, stable, and robust scalability-wise. The security is also top-notch. One user pointed out that "One of the most powerful features in Blue Prism is exception handling. It's one of the features that really differentiates it from other platforms." Blue Prism helps businesses with everything from compliance to quality control and error-avoidance.

SS&C Blue Prism

VisualCron automates tasks like file encryption, scheduling SQL jobs, system integration, data workflow management, and application triggering, making it ideal for handling nightly syncs, FTP server file replacements, job scheduling, and invoice processing.

VisualCron provides an efficient automation solution with features like error and status reporting, API connections, PGP key generation, encryption file creation, and bulk SQL script execution. It simplifies task automation through its mail and event triggers, job variables, conditional execution, and logging with error alerts. Users benefit from its integration capabilities, scheduling flexibility, visual interface, and support for databases and credential management without extensive coding.

What are the most important features?

Simplicity: Easy-to-use interface for seamless automation.
Mail and Event Triggers: Automate tasks based on specific events.
Job Variables: Customize tasks using various input variables.
Conditional Execution: Execute tasks based on predefined conditions.
Error Alerts: Logging and error reporting to ensure task reliability.
Integration Capabilities: Easily connect and integrate with systems and APIs.
Scheduling Flexibility: Create complex schedules with ease.
Visual Interface: User-friendly GUI for efficient management.
Database Support: Manage and automate database tasks efficiently.
Credential Management: Securely handle credentials for various tasks.
PowerShell Commands: Execute PowerShell commands directly.

What are the benefits or ROI users should look for in the reviews?

Efficiency: Streamline and automate repetitive tasks to save time.
Cost Savings: Reduce manual labor and associated costs.
Reliability: Ensure consistency and accuracy in task execution.
Integration: Enhance workflows by integrating with different systems.
Flexibility: Adjust quickly to changes and handle complex scheduling needs.
Support: Benefit from extensive post-sales support and configuration options.
Innovation: Foster innovation by eliminating the need for coding.

Industries like finance, healthcare, and logistics implement VisualCron to automate data workflows, secure file transfers, and schedule critical tasks. It is used to streamline invoice processing, manage large-scale data operations, and ensure compliance through encryption and error reporting. VisualCron enhances operational efficiency, scalability, and security in various sectors, making it essential for businesses requiring robust automation capabilities.

NetCart AB

Sample Customers

Aldergrove Financial Group, Preferred Health Professionals, Mindbeam Technologies, First Credit Union in British Columbia, Vestcom International, Prime Liberty Benefits, University of Tampa, CNLBancshares, World Precision Instruments, BJ's Restaurants, Globe Pequot Press, Accudata Technologies, Norton Healthcare, Pacific Toxicology Laboratories

Coca-Cola, Walgreens, American Express, Royal Bank of Canada, Pfizer, Shop Direct, O2, Siemens, Ascension Healthcare, Jaguar Land Rover

7 Eleven, ABB Sécheron SA, Adobe Systems Incorporated, Amazon Europe Core, Apple, Assa Abloy, Aston Martin, Banco Santander, BMW (Australia)

Buyer's Guide

Blue Prism vs. VisualCron

June 2025

Free Report: Blue Prism vs. VisualCron

Find out what your peers are saying about Blue Prism vs. VisualCron and other solutions. Updated: June 2025.

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