
The easiness to modeling business processes and the flexibility of the tool to be used in various areas and business processes.
The sectors in which I have used Anaplan are: Consumer Goods and Services, Beverage, Manufacturing, Utilities,
Finance and Insurance, Telecommunication Services, Aeros pace & Defense, Electronic & Electrical Equipment, Pharmaceutical, Retail, Wholesale, Automotive Supplier , Online Booking. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com.
UX still to be improved (graphs, customizations and dynamicity). Review collected by and hosted on G2.com.
The platform has incredibly simple formulas that allow for both developers and business users to debug and correct any issues quickly. The ability to build a proof of concept model and further iterate off of that even after the primary developers have left creates an astounding amount of scalability for the product. Additionally through using Anaplan the companies I've worked at have all been blown away by the always on and always accurate nature of a cloud solution, especially where other products require significantly more downtime or refreshes to reflect large scale changes. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com.
Anaplan could improve on the use of custom time dimensions to maximize the efficacy of the platform without causing a significant burden for the development team. The switchover functionality and versions work well out of the box, but additional work should be done to help minimize data sparsity and maximize efficiency. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com.
Anaplan helps businesses transform their financial systems and processes by providing a database, engine and user interface on one platform. As the data store on the cloud , it offers the power combination of one version of truth (data) and real-time result. It also empowers company to have a connected planning with one source of data across all models and enabling each to access data from the others. It also has a friendly and sleek dashboards which only contains relevant data. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com.
As for all the systems out there, there is always a big room for improvement and as for Anaplan we are looking forward to various enhancements on functionalities already on the road. Most of the enhancements are from their current visionaries, hands-on builders, and experienced end users. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com.
The possibility of true connected planning for all businesses. Also, how the development has been put into the hands of the business and not just IT. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com.
Occasionally, support can take longer than it should or not be helpful at all - I often know more about the issue than the support person does, which causes troubleshooting to take longer than it should. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com.
App hub is the part that I like best that can provide people a high possibility of viewing potential functions they will have and give users flexibility to download and reconfigure based on business requirements. Also, the dashboarding is a very good feature that Anaplan has, it provide the possibility that user can see the immediate impact derived from the driver or assumptions. There's no need to move across a bunch of sheets to visualise the result. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com.
The only thing that I would say dislike for Anaplan is the new user interface. It's a good feature that provides better user experience but not all functionalities are well developed so far, some functions of traditional dashboarding are not supported in the NUX. Therefore this is a part that Anaplan can keep developing and provide more possibilities. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com.
Anaplan's flexibility, ability to work at scale, and its extensibility make it an excellent tool that can be applied to large-scale business processes and more granular operational processes alike. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com.
It's licensing/pricing model. It's very confusing to both partners and customers, makes it harder to sell services than it should, and since those conversations occur towards the end of the sales cycle, it can create unnecessary tension between the partner and customer. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com.
It is simple to build (point and click instead of writing code). It is fully customizable. It can be architected to build any train of logic. Therefore it forces the business to truly understand itself when building models. So not only does Anaplan helps teams plan more effectively because it puts structure around their process, but it also allows businesses to think thru, collaborate on, and develop the logic of their business in more details terms. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com.
Anaplan has a tendency to talk the talk about a year before they can walk the walk. This causes many customers to become frustrated when they hear that new functionality is available, but the model builders tell them it is not actually in a useable format yet. However this is not all downside, because it prepares customers for the exciting new changes that are coming to Anaplan.
Also, since any logic can be built in Anaplan, if builders are not careful, it is easy to build an overly complex solution that ends up failing in the end because it cannot adapt to the changing nature of the business. However if builders are thoughtful, it is a great tool to build solutions with the right amount of complexity and pair them with sound business processes. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com.
I like how easy it has been to connect multiple Anaplan models together so business data can be shared easy between groups. It has been seamless for users around the world to be in the system and collaborate. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com.
It is not the best system for visualizations. Users often cannot view the data in formats that they would like, and there are sometimes functionalities that they see in excel that do not carry over into Anaplan that makes it difficult for them to view the data. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com.
Anaplan can be self service system by business users. No need for technical support like admins, developers and other technical staff. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com.
Anaplan is sensitive architecture decisions which could lead to performance issues. In the same time best practices, weaknessm workaround are well known via community discussions, learning programs Review collected by and hosted on G2.com.
Anaplan is relatively intuitive and easy to pick up on if users have a background with MS Excel, which makes it great for system admins and power users since they typically have strong Excel backgrounds and can pick up on the syntax/logic required to build in Anaplan. I also love how quick the implementations are and the ability to have multiple use cases all within the same system (and even same workspace). There's also a strong community with forums, blogs, template models, etc. to assist organizations in their Anaplan journey. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com.
Not too much to dislike, but would like to see improvements in aggregation methods for P&L purposes aggregates everything, but would like ability to have a more flexible option of flipping signs when needed). Review collected by and hosted on G2.com.
Anaplan's freeform platform platform allows users to build and scale the model to meet business needs. Because it's not an out of the box solution with specific use case constraints, we've been able to utilize Anaplan's platform for a multitude of cases. Combining this with data integrations, process actions, and being a collaborate cloud tool, it has been the backbone of our FP&A organization. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com.
While Anaplan has been great from a model builder and finance perspective, the reporting capabilities are lacking. There's no elegant way to consolidate and generate reports for higher level management reporting. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com.
Anaplan is a truly dynamic multi dimensional modeling platform which performs calculations in real time. This allows Anaplan to offer agility, flexibility and power to model any Business planning process or workflow across any function. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com.
There are no major downsides of the platform. The platform is constantly evolving and I am excited for new UI and reporting enhancements which will offer advanced analytics to the end users Review collected by and hosted on G2.com.
Anaplan is real time and dynamic. It also allows businesses to be flexible in their changes and customize to their needs. While traditional planning solutions used to take months in advance to enhance, Anaplan is relatively easy to adapt.
Additionally while other solutions focus on one use case, this allows us to enable the truly connected planning environment. Cross functions are able to collaborate in ways we have not seen in the past. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com.
While Anaplan is great and flexible, sometimes space limitations and design considerations have to be taken into account that can limit a users flexibility in intersections when working with detailed data.
Also while the new UX is helping address some of the cosmetic features of Anaplan, there still is much improvement for filtering and ad hoc reporting for it to truly be a one stop shop. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com.
Anaplan standardizes and promotes healthy processes and workflows within a business. It centralizes key hierarchies which are used across multiple calculations and business units, ensuring everyone is on the same page and eliminating duplication of work effort. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com.
The new UX has a grid system that does not lend itself to holding a lot of data on one dashboard. However, the improved user interface is more attractive than the previous iteration referred to as "classic dashboard" Review collected by and hosted on G2.com.
A single platform that brings data and people together onto one platform, that is continuously improving in functionality and user experience. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com.
While being a flexible solution, it does not have some of the more complex capabilities of bespoke solutions that are specific to certain use cases and industries. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com.
I like the flexibility of Anaplan, their efforts in creating best practices and the amount of effort that is put into their community base. Their training has improved immensely since I started using Anaplan in 2017. They listen to their users and adjust so that newer users being onboarded each year have a better and better experience. The idea of connected planning is also very interesting and something that we'd like to further implement at our company. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com.
The downsides of Anaplan is that it exposes inefficiencies and inconsistencies in the existing processes. Most of the time spent implementing an Anaplan solution is understanding and reshaping business processes. Often times, the time spent actual solution building in Anaplan is a fraction of the time it takes to get the business aligned on process. The flexibility in Anaplan is at times a detriment as there are many different paths to arrive at the end goal, and many paths will cause performance problems or are inefficient. There is a lot of thought that is required to build a sustainable and scalable solution. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com.
I am using Anaplan since year 2015 and switched my career to consulting, before year 2015 I used to work as a Head of Production Planning and Logistics for one of the Tata Group entity. I was responsible for end to end supply chain, production planning , distribution planning , after market and logistics planning. It was very difficult for me to do planning, budgeting, supply chain provisions in excel spread sheets at granular level of details, considering huge count of SKU's I was not able to create detailed rough cut /short term planning at product or product-customer level, because of which I always faced challenges while planning plant capacity, planning constraint based production etc. It was always difficult for me to commit production / distribution to sales team, impact on inventory carrying cost.
From 2015 I have started using Anaplan and I implemented many end to end Anaplan models in the field of Production planning, inventory planning , capacity planning, S&OP, demand planning, supply planning for multiple global customers and I really can see my clients taking huge benefit out of Anaplan in terms of profitability or cost reduction. With proper planning company can decide their strategy to make business more profitable. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com.
Nothing to dislike, I think Anaplan is a great and competitive tool at this point of time in market. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com.
The speed to get to complex answers. It's a very flexible tool and allows you to get to many different answers with a few pivots. It takes difficult to navigate excel documents into clean, crisp models that scale. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com.
The visualization features are limited at times but have improved with the new UX. Some features such as Assign can be a bit difficult to understand from a configuration standpoint, but the materials available online help to alleviate that. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com.
- It's easy set-up - no dedicated server needed (no IT involvement needed)
- No coding skills are needed. Pretty much anyone that can build excel models can build models in Anaplan
- Access control by user
- System of record
- Powerful and flexible
- Connected models
- Great customer support Review collected by and hosted on G2.com.
- Dashboard formatting
- Poor data visualization
- Slow to push community requested features
- When reaching the maximum size of the workspace, models tend to ger slower Review collected by and hosted on G2.com.
Anaplan is a leader in connected planning. It can be described as excel or access on steroids. The tool is flexible and scaleable to adapt to any business objective. The tool exposes silos and barriers in the business that are necessary to have during organizational transformation. The best part is the tool is business owned. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com.
Reporting is currently undergoing a facelift. They are transitioning to a new UX, which provides improved visuals to display data. Currently, there is now way for the platform to realize the current date. This is on the product roadmap and should be resolved in the near future. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com.
The solution is Easy to Implement with Less dependency on IT.
Solutions can be implemented as quickly as 1 week and can be done by existing Business user with Technical know-how.
Huge Time and Cost benefit to companies.
Cloud based technology, so does not require installing or maintaining software.
Upgrades come with zero cost and no IT involvement.
Excel Add-In has been improved and is an advantage to users who are not willing to move away from Excel.
Many Planning Formulas are included which are hard to create or not available in Excel. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com.
Reporting can be improved
Would like to see more frequent Product updates
Free API connectivity is limited and not end user friendly.
Model sizing is another limitation, any solution has to be developed with size in mind.
No single way to solve a problem, which leads to inconsistent model building.
Need to improve connectivity to many widely used platforms. ex. Power BI Review collected by and hosted on G2.com.
Connecting People and Data which helps planners to make the decision faster.
Cloud-based platform which gives the benefit of access Anaplan from anywhere in the world.
User security in Anaplan which control user access with Read and Write capability
Reports/Dashboard which makes end user's life simpler
What if scenario plan add more values to business and the planners to come up with the best forecast and time it takes to plan is very less Review collected by and hosted on G2.com.
User Access setting through an import
For example if the list is a numbered list, then setting user access through file import make it difficult. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com.
Ease of model maintenance for admins. Model admins do not need to have extensive knowledge of coding language and can be adopted by any users that have a general background of financial modeling in previous roles. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com.
The reporting visualizations in Anaplan are not as extensive as some other reporting tools, however, they still get the job done. Review collected by and hosted on G2.com.