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BMC Helix Automation Console vs Skybox Security Suite comparison

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Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Sep 1, 2025

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

Zafran Security
Sponsored
Ranking in Vulnerability Management
17th
Average Rating
9.6
Reviews Sentiment
7.8
Number of Reviews
6
Ranking in other categories
Continuous Threat Exposure Management (CTEM) (1st)
BMC Helix Automation Console
Ranking in Vulnerability Management
45th
Average Rating
7.6
Reviews Sentiment
7.5
Number of Reviews
2
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
Skybox Security Suite
Ranking in Vulnerability Management
47th
Average Rating
7.6
Reviews Sentiment
6.8
Number of Reviews
37
Ranking in other categories
Firewall Security Management (7th)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of October 2025, in the Vulnerability Management category, the mindshare of Zafran Security is 1.0%, up from 0.1% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of BMC Helix Automation Console is 0.2%, up from 0.2% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Skybox Security Suite is 0.6%, up from 0.5% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Vulnerability Management Market Share Distribution
ProductMarket Share (%)
Zafran Security1.0%
BMC Helix Automation Console0.2%
Skybox Security Suite0.6%
Other98.2%
Vulnerability Management
 

Featured Reviews

Israel Cavazos Landini - PeerSpot reviewer
Weekly insights and risk analysis facilitate informed security decisions
I appreciate the weekly insights Zafran provides, which include critical topics for networks and IT security, allowing us to evaluate which insights apply to our environment. The organization score feature is valuable to keep the leadership team updated on how our infrastructure fares security-wise. The applicable risk level versus base risk level feature is beneficial because prior to Zafran, we only used the base risk level, but now understand that risk depends on the asset itself. Zafran is an excellent tool.
ShashiGupta - PeerSpot reviewer
Reasonably Priced
In terms of improvement, the product could benefit from streamlining the implementation process, particularly regarding customization. Currently, the process involves navigating through multiple layers of custom and staging forms, which can be cumbersome and time-consuming. Another aspect to consider is the foundation data provided out of the box, particularly regarding categorization and its associated values. This foundational data may only sometimes meet the mark, as organizations often require more flexibility to tailor it to their needs. Discovering hardware, for instance, can lead to different category processing needs, with certain layers providing minimal benefits. The challenge lies in the inability to directly specify servers, hardware, software, and their respective details, highlighting a need for improvement in this area. As per the current state of the Helix product, it has seen some resolution to issues but still faces challenges when adding more attributes. It can lead to restrictions, particularly with the progressive view page, limiting flexibility in certain cases. While benefits can be gained in other aspects, such drawbacks are common. Improvements are necessary to enhance flexibility in this regard. Exploring alternative solutions like containerization or cloud services may offer opportunities for optimization, requiring careful consideration due to the complexity involved. I'm still determining the current strategy. While there have been improvements in the latest version, there's still a need for further enhancements in an extended version. Additionally, stakeholders, including manufacturing companies, emphasize the importance of fine-tuning performance for the Helix product. The search functionality remains problematic, often taking more than 15 seconds, undermining reliability.
NenadMijatovic - PeerSpot reviewer
Efficient in vulnerability management, stable and easy to use
Vulnerability management is the most valuable feature because it lets you focus on the most critical vulnerabilities. That's the important thing. Here in Serbia, there are not so many companies that have too many firewalls inside one company. So, they usually don't buy this model for Firewall Assurance unless there is some compliance. So you can prove that your firewalls are compliant. So, that model is not so important here in Serbia. It's for bigger companies. So, they usually buy network assurance to build the model of the network and vulnerability management to focus on the most important vulnerabilities. Moreover, Skybox can collect data for many vendors. From the endpoint protection vendors to the network equipment vendors to other security vendors. So, it supports more than one hundred vendors to collect data from them.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"We are able to see the real risk of a vulnerability on our environment with our security tools."
"Zafran is an excellent tool."
"Zafran has become an indispensable tool in our cybersecurity arsenal."
"We saw benefits from Zafran Security almost immediately after deploying it."
"Overall, we have seen about eighty-seven percent reduction of the number of vulnerabilities that require urgency to remediate, specifically the number of criticals."
"Takes reports from other vulnerabilities."
"It's reasonably priced."
"It has a good policy management feature and can provide customers with good quality outputs."
"The revalidation and policy recertifications are most valuable."
"Robust modules can be used for different parts of network security."
"It can be integrated with a vulnerability management solution. When a client comes, apart from pitching network and firewall change management, we are recommending having vulnerability management. So, rather than just having the audit of the firewall, they can integrate it with their vulnerability management solution, which could be Rapid7, Qualys, or any other solution. This provides them the most value out of the platform. That is the way we are approaching our customer base."
"Aside from Firewall Assurance, we are using Network Assurance and Change Manager for an overview of the whole network and for documenting requests and the recertification of the ruleset."
"Change Manager is most important because of the impact on each other of a network change or a firewall change. We want to understand this and to know, beforehand, what the impact of a change will be. We are a large network so that is a very important tool."
"The product's most valuable feature is vulnerability management."
"The most valuable features are Firewall Assurance and Vulnerability Control."
 

Cons

"The dashboarding and reporting functionality of Zafran Security is an area that definitely could use some improvements."
"I think the ability to have some enhanced reporting capabilities is something they can improve on, as they have good reports but we have asked for some specific reporting enhancements."
"Initially, we were somewhat concerned about the scalability of Zafran due to our large asset count and the substantial amount of information we needed to process."
"No third-party applications or integrations with additional software solutions."
"In terms of improvement, the product could benefit from streamlining the implementation process, particularly regarding customization."
"I've had issues with licensing where, when they were expiring and I asked for the updated licenses, I would the wrong ones. I think their process needs to be straightened out a little bit - I don't know if they fixed it already, it has been awhile. It wasn't as straightforward as it could have been."
"The price could be cheaper."
"There is room for improvement in the technical support."
"Modifications and the deletion of existing policies are currently unavailable."
"There are multiple dashboards but no custom dashboard. It would be good to include a custom dashboard so that we can actually choose which field and what kinds of things we want to look at."
"The dashboard's UI is not interesting; it is quite normal. It would be better if something more attractive or similar useful information found in AlgoSec was available."
"The support could be improved."
"Skybox Security Suite's attack surface management feature needs improvement."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

Information not available
Information not available
"Pricing is on the higher side. In terms of licensing, you should buy the complete suite rather than buying only the Change Manager. I think Change Manager with Vulnerability Control is something that would be interesting to look at."
"Fully understand the total cost of ownership. They have gone to a new model where you have to replace the hardware every X amount of years at a very substantial cost and fully understand your intended number of nodes. To operate a firewall, you have to pay two licenses, a firewall node and a network node. If you are a reasonable-sized organization, this gets expensive very quickly."
"I think for the cost, what we got definitely is worth it. The only caution I would give is that whenever you license for Firewall Assurance at the same time, for some weird reason, you have to get one Network Assurance license, just to manage one firewall. That's a little bit of overkill. But otherwise, in general, the pricing is fairly okay."
"The product's pricing is excellent value. In terms of licensing, make sure you understand your network components, all your hops through your network, thoroughly, before you decide on the total cost. If you want to do point-to-point flow analysis and such, you need to have the configuration of all the devices in between point A and point B. A lot of people don't realize all their network components until they start using this product."
"It's expensive."
"The software is expensive. I rate its pricing an eight out of ten."
"Skybox Security Suite has indeed helped us reduce costs. The prices of AlgoSec and Skybox Security Suite are approximately 50 percent different. The tool may require special vendor support from abroad, resulting in slightly higher costs. Its pricing is in the middle."
"With licensing, the number of network nodes becomes very expensive to the point where you have to rationalize if the tools are warranted anymore."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
11%
Computer Software Company
9%
Manufacturing Company
8%
Government
5%
No data available
Financial Services Firm
18%
Computer Software Company
12%
Manufacturing Company
10%
Energy/Utilities Company
6%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
No data available
No data available
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business21
Midsize Enterprise4
Large Enterprise20
 

Questions from the Community

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Zafran Security?
Since we stood Zafran Security up in our private cloud, we handle the maintenance on our side. As we opted not to use...
What needs improvement with Zafran Security?
In terms of areas for improvement, Zafran Security is doing a really great job as a new and emerging company. Oftenti...
What is your primary use case for Zafran Security?
My use cases for Zafran Security revolve around two primary areas. One is around vulnerability management and priorit...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for BMC Helix Remediate?
If you want to install or consume this BMC product, licensing cost is one factor, but the facility features you will ...
What needs improvement with BMC Helix Remediate?
In terms of improvement, the product could benefit from streamlining the implementation process, particularly regardi...
What do you like most about Skybox Security Suite?
Overall, the tool has helped us reduce risks. If any step is missing, it's easier for my team or engineers to identif...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Skybox Security Suite?
From a commercial perspective, AlgoSec is more expensive compared to Skybox Security Suite. Skybox Security Suite is ...
What needs improvement with Skybox Security Suite?
The dashboard's UI is not interesting; it is quite normal. It would be better if something more attractive or similar...
 

Also Known As

No data available
TrueSight Vulnerability Management, SecOps Response Service, BladeLogic Threat Director, BMC Helix Remediate
No data available
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Information Not Available
Online Business Systems
ADP, Blue Cross Blue Shield, BT, USAID, Delta Dental, EDF Energy, EMC, HSBC, Johnson & Johnson
Find out what your peers are saying about BMC Helix Automation Console vs. Skybox Security Suite and other solutions. Updated: September 2025.
872,008 professionals have used our research since 2012.