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Fortra's Automate vs OpCon comparison

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Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive Summary

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

Automation Anywhere
Sponsored
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
6.9
Number of Reviews
641
Ranking in other categories
Business Process Management (BPM) (2nd), Robotic Process Automation (RPA) (2nd), Process Mining (1st), Intelligent Document Processing (IDP) (1st), Agentic Automation (1st), Business Orchestration and Automation Technologies (1st), AI Legal & Compliance (1st), AI Finance & Accounting (1st), AI Procurement & Supply Chain (1st)
Fortra's Automate
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
7.0
Number of Reviews
44
Ranking in other categories
Robotic Process Automation (RPA) (4th), Business Orchestration and Automation Technologies (5th)
OpCon
Average Rating
9.2
Reviews Sentiment
7.3
Number of Reviews
59
Ranking in other categories
Workload Automation (12th)
 

Mindshare comparison

Robotic Process Automation (RPA) Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
Fortra's Automate2.8%
UiPath Platform10.2%
Microsoft Power Automate6.7%
Other80.3%
Robotic Process Automation (RPA)
Workload Automation Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
OpCon2.3%
Control-M11.4%
AutoSys Workload Automation6.8%
Other79.5%
Workload Automation
 

Featured Reviews

Venkat Sivaprakash - PeerSpot reviewer
Management Consultant at Accenture
Has significantly improved document-driven workflows and reduced processing time across finance and HR functions
Automation Anywhere has evolved significantly and upgraded itself to provide agentic AI and AI-based automation solutions for document automation. The product has matured considerably over time. We can create workflows that can call an API. We can include prompts in particular workflows for ChatGPT-related functions, connecting to an LLM and RAG to perform tasks. For document automation, modern features are available to train documents, ensuring high accuracy and repeatability over time. The system is very easy to use. I recently completed a course in document automation, typically designed for people involved in coding and technical aspects. Though I understand coding comprehensively, I don't do actual coding. The course was very accessible. Currently, extensive coding isn't necessary due to the hybrid model incorporating GenAI aspects, low-code, no-code capabilities, APIs, and numerous pre-built objects in Automation Anywhere. The features include GenAI-driven prompting methods and workflow creation capabilities. In these workflows, we can create decision boxes and call APIs without coding. We simply pull objects, drop them, connect them, and add minimal coding when needed. The most crucial aspect isn't coding but rather sizing the automation and fleshing out the details. Automation Co-pilot takes notes and performs automated analysis. It can extract details from videos, summarize conversations, and provide detailed information. During calls, it identifies instructions and performs tasks such as preparing reports and reconciliation. Automation Anywhere can also connect with Microsoft Co-pilot. Through Co-pilot, real-time operations can be executed, allowing direct interaction between vendors and automation through this component.
Anthony Tuhame - PeerSpot reviewer
Information Technology Manager at Everseen
Automation has reduced night-time server checks and now manages reporting and cloud monitoring
The downsides I normally mention about Fortra's Automate are about reports and deep analytics. While Fortra's Automate can manage our servers, it can give you a problem report that says what happened, but it doesn't give you a clear picture of why it happened or how many times your servers went offline. This pushes us to get another third-party tool. We have to generate those simple reports from Fortra's Automate and push them to another software in Tableau. We use Tableau for analytics to analyze that data and understand what the trends are, what the instance is telling us, and what the clear problem is. It lacks that deep analytics feature. Additionally, I am not impressed with the interface, as it feels outdated and it has taken a long time to see any updates or changes. I believe those are the two downsides, but the customer support is adequate.
Jose Rivera Hernandez - PeerSpot reviewer
Senior VP of Technology at Triangle Credit Union
Helps automate all kinds of jobs and it's worth the price because it saves a lot of time and money
One problem that I had with them when we got SMA Technologies is that sometimes the jobs fail, but they automatically restart. SMA Technologies automatically gets a notification that the job has failed, and they restart it on their end, so now, we have the job restarting twice. There were times when we came into the office in the morning, and we had two files because the job ran twice. I do not know if the system can prevent a job from running the second time. If a job has run successfully, or it is running, it should not run again.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"Automation Anywhere reduced the manpower up to 80% with a high return on investment."
"The way templates can be configured is quite simple - it's a matter of drag and drop."
"This solution saves time when completing our pharmaceutical processes, which allows things to progress faster to the FDA."
"It is easy to automate SAP by using Cloning and Metabot."
"IQ Bot is very helpful as it is easy to learn and implement and the data output accuracy is almost 90%. Over time, the BOT learns from the validation which is an added advantage. Whatever I was thinking for version 11.3, it's being implemented in A2019. The incorporation of Python scripts is also implemented which will be easier for validations."
"Automation Anywhere has lots of features, some of them are accuracy increases, time consumption reduced, scalability. Automation Anywhere does not require a strong knowledge of programming languages. The dashboard is user-friendly."
"The simplicity and ease of use is the most valuable part of Automation Anywhere."
"The MetaBots are by far the most effective system within AA. Due to the fact that no scripting is required and only the passing of variables or values to get a definite result. IQ Bot with the ABBY OCR is a powerful component to do multiple extractions in the shortest possible timeframe in comparison to human execution of similarly identified tasks or operations."
"Automate's best feature is that we do not need to write any code; we can create our jobs using the drag and drop option available, and any technical member without coding expertise can use this tool."
"The solution is continuously adding more integrations to help with workflows and bot and task creation."
"This product is quite easy to install, learn, and use, with our new employees being able to start using it in projects for clients after only two weeks of internal training."
"The best features of the solution are the flexible automation features, it is rich with beautiful connectors, and it is easy to use with little to no coding knowledge required to get started, so anybody can use the tool."
"We have tried other RPA solutions like UiPath or Automation Anywhere. They are fantastic products but complex, and it's hard to understand everything. It would be best if you had a skilled developer or several. Automate is easy to implement, administer, and use. It's appropriate for us because our cases are simple and easy to automate. We don't need complicated tools with many features; We prefer to get a significant ROI quickly."
"The automated analytics have helped improve our business processes since it has increased our efficiency by automating our everyday tasks, freeing up time for us to focus more on strategic activities such as analyzing data and developing new business strategies."
"I like the interface; it makes managing automation easy. We can set different schedules and templates for each task."
"Overall, the whole product is really nice and provides significant benefits."
"If we're counting all the manual intervention, as a percentage, I would say that OpCon has reduced data processing by 90 percent, through automation, the efficiency, and the eliminating of manual errors."
"A good example is our ACH processing; we used to have somebody come in early in the morning to do all of our ACH processing (our incoming items processing), and now it runs automatically at three in the morning so when they come in all the work is done, they come in later, don't have as much work, and it's reduced our workload drastically."
"OpCon has streamlined our operations, reducing the number of jobs by about 17 percent, optimizing and automating the scheduling of our programs, and enabling us to immediately create tickets in ServiceNow when a job is down using web services."
"OpCon has features that we haven't had time to even use, so I'd say we're happy with where they're at when it comes to the feature set."
"We have automated 95 percent of our processes since deploying this solution."
"We particularly like the fact that it's graphical because it is Windows-based. Before, we were text-based on the mainframe. You can also produce flow charts. Because it's point-and-click, its ease of use is very nice."
"The automation part of OpCon is the most valuable for us, with all the core processing. It's really mostly hands-off unless we have failures. In our old days, we'd spend a good part of the day doing processing via manual tasks. We don't have to do any of that any longer."
"Since we got it configured, it has just done the job day in, day out. Being able to rely on it and know that it's going to happen, whether there's a person over it or not, is really good."
 

Cons

"Getting the bot design into the developer's hands is taking longer than we initially anticipated."
"Logging into Automation Anywhere takes some time. I use it frequently, and each login currently takes some time. A reduction in this time would be helpful."
"Automation Anywhere has to be integrated with machine learning and AI systems to read images and videos, then put the information into another format."
"Not all data is good quality. This presents a challenge for automation, which is important."
"AA has many features but the issue is with the loss of overhead on computing resources. For example, if the bot is encrypted, the bot should decrypt it first then act accordingly. If there are issues with the logic in the bot, there will be a lot of computer memory overload. There should be an additional feature for cloud functionality."
"There is an issue with the object cloning in Excel. OCR is also not that stable. Image recognition works fine, but not all the time."
"The document processing, OCR, needs to be more accurate. Sometimes, when you try it on documents, it keeps on failing and goes to a different queue. It needs to mature."
"The goal of any automation is to provide efficiencies... I would like a default feature where each bot gives us data on all the benefits it provides from its process."
"The interface of Fortra's Automate is similar to GoAnywhere; I am not completely pleased with it, although it is intuitive, but it lacks something in terms of complexity."
"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 would like to see some better web automation, a wizard like the one in the product WinAutomation would be very nice."
"Additionally, I am not impressed with the interface, as it feels outdated and it has taken a long time to see any updates or changes."
"Fortra's Automate is not as reliable as I would like it to be."
"The OCR for Hebrew text needs to be improved."
"The workflow for variables could be better. The input and output of task-level variables could be made a little clearer in terms of passing those around from one task to another upon success, etc. Things like that could be a little easier potentially."
"It would be an improvement if Automate had better stability tools, whether by recommending a certain amount of memory because it can be a memory hog at times."
"I believe there's room for improvement, and while I think it's something they are considering, I would welcome seeing OpCon integrate with a broader range of systems and third-party products."
"It is a pricey solution. Comparatively speaking, you can certainly find schedulers which are cheaper."
"There is some difficulty with the ease of use when I don't have some of the templates that were already created. More templates would be great. Non-core featured templates are my biggest struggle."
"The only downside to OpCon is that its features can be complicated and really must be taught. Most of our users don't have training beyond the free Basic Training that SMA provides, so for fresh eyes, it is kind of difficult to understand some of the language used."
"Expect price hikes and threats when you hold them to account at every opportunity."
"I would like to see OpCon being accessible using a mobile app."
"I would like to see them improve the Solution Manager for the web application. It's the future for us. Our customers need a lot of functionality, but there isn't that functionality within Solution Manager. So they have to develop and improve it."
"It does not have the ability to interact with third-parties via the web/Internet. We have certain processes where we have to interact with a third-party on a website, and unfortunately OpCon just cannot do that."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"It is fantastic. It has been great. It is perfectly priced for the quality received. When paying for quality, that is exactly what you get."
"We have saved a lot of money on taxes based on the stuff that we run."
"It depends. For example, for my group, we are centralizing the infrastructure in Paris. Our contract is signed with Automation Anywhere in France. The currency and the pricing of Automation Anywhere in France can appear beneficial and interesting for Germany and Scandinavian countries, but when we share our infra and are internally charging other countries such as Poland, Brazil, or some other country with a lower currency value as compared to Euro, it becomes less beneficial. They would prefer to sign the contract directly with Automation Anywhere because they will benefit from a price that is as per their local market."
"Although the initial implementation cost of Automation Anywhere is relatively high compared to other options, its annual subscription cost is lower than UiPath's, which has the opposite pricing structure."
"They're very flexible around pricing and licensing."
"Our advice is that anybody interested in this product should negotiate product bundles in order to reduce the cost of installation and setup."
"We are interested in saving manual engineer man-hours. So far, we have saved $100,000."
"Subscription for Automation Anywhere (AA) is paid yearly."
"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."
"From a distributor's perspective, one of the biggest selling points of Automate is its price point."
"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 comes with a package that costs approximately $20,000 USD per year."
"I like the way this solution is priced because you can buy a license, or you can buy the software outright."
"The cost is a bit high for a small business like ours, but we manage with Fortra's Automate."
"Once you buy the software, you just pay for the support for backend help."
"Compared to other products, the pricing model for this solution is much more convenient, flexible, and adaptable to the Portuguese reality."
"While the overall cost is reasonable, I'm interested in exploring options for making the managed automation solution, specifically the mass solution, more cost-effective."
"Scaling is pricey."
"I am the one who signs the contract. In the beginning, when I started working here, it seemed very expensive, but after I learned everything that it does, I found it worth the price."
"It's definitely worth the cost."
"Compared to AutoSys and ISE, OpCon was a lot cheaper to put in. AutoSys is hundreds of thousands of dollars to just install it because they don't have an interface into our system. You have to teach them what your system does."
"It used to be per machine, so we had X number of devices licensed. Now it's not. If we had a lot of machines, the new license might've decreased the cost. Unfortunately, we didn't see the same gains."
"The pricing is very reasonable."
"Yearly, we're paying about $62,000. OpCon has an all-inclusive feature and module license, but you pay per task."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
17%
Construction Company
12%
Manufacturing Company
11%
Computer Software Company
7%
Financial Services Firm
11%
Manufacturing Company
9%
Computer Software Company
7%
Outsourcing Company
6%
Computer Software Company
23%
Financial Services Firm
16%
Construction Company
7%
Manufacturing Company
5%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business154
Midsize Enterprise82
Large Enterprise536
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business31
Midsize Enterprise14
Large Enterprise10
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business16
Midsize Enterprise29
Large Enterprise19
 

Questions from the Community

How good is Automation Anywhere for RPA processes?
It depends on your use case. Is it simply to automate a couple of processes? Is it to augment a human team? AA is ver...
How good is Automation Anywhere for RPA processes?
From my experience using AA tool, it depends on the applications that you want to automate, because there some applic...
How good is Automation Anywhere for RPA processes?
It is a highly preferred RPA tool. You can check my Automation Anywhere Review to know more.
What is your primary use case for HelpSystems AutoMate?
Fortra's Automate has two or three use cases in this scenario. The feature I appreciate most is the drag and drop opt...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Fortra Automate?
Regarding the pricing of Fortra's Automate, for a startup or mid-market company, I would say it is not cheap and is d...
What needs improvement with Fortra Automate?
One thing I dislike about Fortra's Automate is that it does not perform well with OCR software, which is optical char...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for OpCon?
I am the one who signs the contract. In the beginning, when I started working here, it seemed very expensive, but aft...
What needs improvement with OpCon?
One problem that I had with them when we got SMA Technologies is that sometimes the jobs fail, but they automatically...
What is your primary use case for OpCon?
In this credit union, we use OpCon for automation. That is the main use of it. We have over 3,000 jobs and schedules ...
 

Also Known As

Automation Anywhere, Testing Anywhere, Automation Anywhere Enterprise, Agentic Process Automation System (Now Certified for WorkSpaces)
HelpSystems Automate, Automate
No data available
 

Interactive Demo

Demo not available
Demo not available
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Google, Linkedin, Cisco, Juniper Networks, DellEMC, Comcast, Mastercard, Quest Diagnostics
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
LOHR, Carnival Cruise Lines, Herbalife, Digital Federal Credit Union, Synergent, Frandsen Bank & Trust
Find out what your peers are saying about UiPath, Automation Anywhere, Microsoft and others in Robotic Process Automation (RPA). Updated: June 2026.
902,270 professionals have used our research since 2012.