ProcessMaker RFP Template

Provide a Management Summary of your strengths in managing your business, describing your company's background, current organization, market focus and geographic locations served. In addition, please explain how you will provide a value added advantage in service and technology.

Response:

ProcessMaker, Inc. is the developer of ProcessMaker, leading open source Business Process Management (BPM) software.  ProcessMaker allows organizations to design, automate, manage, and improve their approval driven business processes.  ProcessMaker is simple enough for business users yet powerful enough for technical users and allows both parties to work together using a standards based diagramming language to automate workflows throughout an organization.

At ProcessMaker we understand that your competitive edge as a company depends on how well your unique processes are managed. We also believe firmly that implementing a solution for your business process management should be easy, require as little retraining of employees as possible, and generate immediate returns on your investment of time and money.  We developed ProcessMaker to make it easy to automate your form-based, approval driven processes and put an end to issues related to the lack of process management, visibility and control.

ProcessMaker is being used by thousands of companies with tens of thousands of users around the globe.  ProcessMaker has been translated into 17 languages, has a developer community of more than 5,000 members, and is represented by more than 30 certified partners on 5 continents.

ProcessMaker can deliver the following key functionalities, among many others, to customers to satisfy its process needs:

• Easy to access, light footprint, high performance business process management solution.
• Easy to use functionalities available for the creation of workflows, forms and other resources to ensure a correct process scenario and automation result.
• Complete process visibility through the integration of process inputs in a single environment (users, resources, systems and others)
• Tracking capabilities and email based notifications that will ensure efficient user participation.   Desired process control for efficient execution related to assigned process tasks.
• Form capabilities able to replicate any form-related requirements.  Easy to use form editor and dynamic features to ensure ease of access to forms by end users.
• Various reporting options.  Spreadsheet, exportable type reports and dashboards are available.
• Integration capabilities have no limitation; through ProcessMaker’s web services API any system can be integrated to the solution.
• The ProcessMaker solution can easily integrate with specific systems such as: External Databases, Active Directory, Outlook and many others.
• Extended functionality is available as well, such as: Actions by Email, Service Level Agreement Management, Business Rules Management and others.
• Very scalable and expandable solution capabilities that through specific customization, can accomplish to deliver almost any requirements demanded by process needs.

Indicate whether your company is currently for sale or involved in any transaction to expand or be acquired and if so, please explain.

Response:

ProcessMaker is not and does not have the intention of being sold to any other company nor plans to be acquired by another solution.  Unlike many of our competitors, we have no debt and we are very profitable and tightly held.  We do not make decisions driven by short term VC pressures to raise funding.  We do not need funding nor are we planning to seek funding.

Identify your primary competitors for similar services and explain how your firm’s service offerings differ from these competitors.

Response:

Our main competitors are Oracle, Appian, and Aura Portal among others.  ProcessMaker rises above the competition in several aspects. The most important of these is the ease and speed of modeling a Process.   All of our clients tell us that they choose ProcessMaker because of the ease of use of our technology.  Our technology makes it easier to develop processes, easier to modify the software when needed and much easier to scale and manage the technology.  In general, we stick with the motto that simpler is better.  Besides a simpler approach to process automation, ProcessMaker is significantly less expensive than the competitors named above.  With very little sacrifice in functionality, ProcessMaker offers a much better overall value proposition.

• Does the tool support multiple languages?

  • Which ones?

  • How does it support these languages?

    • On screens/ forms?   

    • In documentation?  

    • In Training materials?

       

Response:

ProcessMaker's user interface is now available in 17 different languages including the following: English, Spanish, Chinese (simplified and traditional), Czech, Danish, Polish, French, Arabic, Turkish, Portuguese, Finnish, German, Italian, among others.

When editing a process, the titles and descriptions for Processes, Tasks, DynaForms, Input Documents, Output Documents, and Triggers are saved according to the current system language of ProcessMaker. For example, if a task title was set while ProcessMaker was in English and then the language is changed to Spanish then that title will be displayed to any user who enters ProcessMaker in English.

This feature allows the creation of multilingual processes which change language according to the language of the user, but it means that you will have to design processes in every language used by your users. Otherwise, they will see blank titles and descriptions for the various objects in the process.

Documentation and training are available both in English and Spanish.

If a language is not currently supported, how easy is it to bring on other languages if required?

Response:

ProcessMaker provides a translation engine to allow ProcessMaker to be translated into any language. Currently, ProcessMaker has been translated to 17 different languages, including RTL languages such as Arabic and Hebrew. ProcessMaker utilizes files with a .po extension for easy translation. This means that to add another language to ProcessMaker is possible by simply using any PO file editor and making changes to the text and then uploading it to the ProcessMaker interface.

For more information regarding ProcessMaker translations, please review the following link: http://wiki.processmaker.com/index.php/Translating_ProcessMaker

Is ProcessMaker self-contained or can it run inside a third party enterprise portal?

Response:

ProcessMaker is a web based Business Process Management Solution where you can decide to use the ProcessMaker front end and run the application as its own application, or you can embed the application in an enterprise portal by calling the key elements (Inbox, Start Case) via REST and embedding it in the portal.   We have many customers that choose to run their  user experiences within their own portals and applications, ranging from Sharepoint to Joomla and many other third party solutions.  We also have client software in which Outlook or Gmail are the user experience portal.

To what extent can end users customize the composition and layout of their own user experiences?

Response:

Using the REST API a user can build a completely customer user experience.  This could be a mobile app, a gmail client, an outlook client, an embedded client in a portal, etc.  We have customers running ProcessMaker based on all of these examples today.  Additionally, customers can manage the following settings in our standard interface: 

• 
  Skins/themes: new themes can be created by editing CSS files and uploading them to ProcessMaker. Each user can select the theme of their choice. In addition, a system administrator can setup the default theme. For details please refer to the link below:
• http://wiki.processmaker.com/index.php/ProcessMaker_skins.
• Custom case list: the user inbox fields can be customized via an enterprise plugin in terms of fields that are shown or hidden. For details, please refer to the following link:
• http://wiki.processmaker.com/index.php/Cases_List_Builder.

What team collaboration features are supported?

Response:

Workflow Execution

ProcessMaker has several features that allow for collaboration:

• Case Notes - a user may add a note to a case that can then be sent to all other participating users in the workflow.
• Supervisor Review - any user that is designated as a supervisor may at any time make edits to a workflow case. The exact items need to be defined first in the workflow design and then will be made available for all supervisors of the workflow.

Workflow Design

ProcessMaker does not support collaborative process design, like google docs does for example. We do expect to support collaborative process designing in a future version of the ProcessMaker process mapping tool (Version 5+)

How does the user interact with the tool in runtime?

Response:

The end user has several methods to interact with ProcessMaker during process execution:

• 
  ProcessMaker web portal: the default user interface is a web portal via which users have access to their inbox (list of currently assigned process executions or cases). The portal also allows users to start new cases, search for cases, among others. In addition, users with appropriate permissions can design new processes, including their components (variables, forms, templates, input and output documents, database connections, etc.) via the web portal. It is worth mentioning that ProcessMaker forms (Dynaforms) are fully responsive, hence the user can fill them and, in general, perform work, via web portal on a mobile device.
• ProcessMaker mobile application: available for Android and iOS, the mobile application allows end users to perform work on assigned cases as well as create new cases from a mobile device. It also allows the use of more advanced form controls that leverage the array of sensors available in mobile devices, including GPS sensors, camera, microphone and touchscreen, to store information such as position, pictures, videos, audio recordings and even finger signatures on dynaforms.
• Third party integrations: ProcessMaker's REST API allows to easily develop external applications that can, for example, list assigned cases, render dynaforms and submit them to ProcessMaker. In this scenario, the end-user does not need to access ProcessMaker's portal, but all work is performed on the external web application, which in turn uses ProcessMaker as a backend service.

Can diagrams created in other tools be imported using BPMN 2.0 XML

Response:

As long as those diagrams are saved using .bpmn extensions, they will be capable of being uploaded into the ProcessMaker Designer.

Can users save file attachments in the tool and are there limitations on file attachments?

Response:

An "Input Document" is a box that holds a file or files associated with a particular case. These files can be text documents, spreadsheets, images or any other kind of file.

An Input Document can be a hard copy (which has been printed out and stored in a filing cabinet), a digital file which is uploaded to the case, or both. From version 3.0.1.5, an Input Document can also be related to a file object in a DynaForm.

When configuring an Input Document ProcessMaker gives the option of setting up the maximum file size which is a required field which defines in KB or MB the maximum size of the file to be attached. If set to zero, then the file size is unlimited. Nevertheless, the limit is configured inside the php.ini file by the upload_max_size setting and that limit is shown in parenthesis when creating an Input Document. After filling the fields with the necessary information click on "Save".

Confirmation that the tool is able to support document management and / or integrate with other Document Management Platforms, providing detailed information about the tools capabilities including ‘out of the box’ support for SharePoint and IBM FileNet?

Response:

ProcessMaker contains a native workflow document management system within it which allows for the uploading and production of documents within a process.  Input documents can be attached to a case and passed along with the case from user to user to use as reference.  Utilizing version control, these input documents can also be downloaded, modified and then re-uploaded to a case.  Output documents can also be generated by ProcessMaker by taking information in a case which has been entered by a user or several users, then add that data to a pre-built template where it can then be outputted as a .doc or .pdf file.

The document management system stores all of the above documents in a repository which can be accessed by users (with the correct permissions) in order to look at documents past or present and does not run independent from the other modules.  When the administrator configures an input or output document for a process, they can specify a file path for the repository which can be static, dynamic or a mixture of both.

The result is a document management system with documents organized into folders and subfolders relative to data within a process.  While all documents can be viewed from within an active case, users with the correct viewing permissions can navigate the repository, also view documents associated with cases and even download or upload documents to the repository. For additional information please refer to this link: http://www.processmaker.com/workflow-document-management

On the integration side, ProcessMaker can also store documents with third party DMS systems. The integration is done by ProcessMaker's API using REST (Representational State Transfer) to allow external scripts to remotely access and control ProcessMaker. It provides a large number of endpoints so that almost any action which can be done within the ProcessMaker interface can also be done remotely using REST. ProcessMaker functionality can be reimplemented in external web pages, desktop applications and remote scripts. Using ProcessMaker's REST API, custom interfaces can be created to access ProcessMaker.

In addition, ProcessMaker includes predefined integrations with Alfresco and Sharepoint ECMs that allow for the most common document management tasks, including uploading and downloading documents.  We also have connectors for certain versions of Filenet but not all versions.

Describe the out-of-the-box and user- designed dashboards, including drill down from aggregate metrics to individual instances, alerts and automatically triggered actions.

Response:

The ProcessMaker dashboard provides real time monitoring of the efficiency and productivity of processes and users executing those processes. Managers and supervisors can use the dashboards to check up on the productivity of employees and measure how well departments are functioning. Dashboards are essential for gauging the effectiveness of a process and figuring out to improve it in the future.

One of the goals of good Business Process Management (BPM) is continuous process improvement, which can only be achieved through effective measuring and monitoring. For more information, please see this page: http://wiki.processmaker.com/index.php/2.0.X/Dashboards

ProcessMaker’s Advanced Dashboards give organizations the ability to monitor large amounts of data about their processes. Whether it’s measuring the productivity of departments by process, or identifying bottlenecks in processes, the advanced dashboards provide both simple information at a glance and detailed information in a drill-down feature. It allows regular users to check the state of the processes, cases, tasks, users and tables in interactive statistics and graphics in 4 user-friendly dashlets:

• PM Table

• Cases Drill Down

• Cases Drill Down By Category

• Custom Drill Down 

After clicking on “Participated” as shown above, users can see another graph below based on each process.

After clicking on the process above, users would then drill into the level of tasks as shown below:

One more final click, and the user arrives to the data of the actual record.

Manage/ Measure Process Performance  

• Ability to report process performance metrics and KPI’s

• In real time

• Historically and with trends

Response:

We understand that one of the most important factors in choosing to use a BPMS is visibility, accountability and the ability to see Key Performance Indicators related to your business process at a glance. This in turn enables the business owner or analyst to make important decisions on how to further enhance and improve on the existing process, thereby further increasing the importance of the visibility into the KPI’s of the process, in real time.

Therefore, ProcessMaker has made it a priority to provide the important data that is necessary for making these decisions and making the data available in a visually pleasing interface.  Below you will see an example of one of the many possible dashboard configurations that is possible in ProcessMaker.

In addition for the need to see visually your KPI’s, we also understand the need for canned reports and making sense of data at a record set level.  ProcessMaker has a reporting engine that enables business users to maintain visibility into the detailed data views of each individual application of the process, complete with filters, search, groupings, sums, and counts among other aggregate functions as well as the ability to export the data as a PDF file or Excel file for your preference.

Describe the tools provided for creating user interface forms. What skills are required for user interface form design?

Response:

Form design is based on a user friendly drag and drop interface. The interface allows the designer to test how the form will look under different screen form factors, allowing for easy testing of the mobile version of the forms at design time. Knowledge of JavaScript and JQuery, though not required, will allow for a more rich and dynamic form experience.

What type of training services does your company provide for the solution?

Response:

ProcessMaker provides three options for getting proficient and taking ownership of the solution:

• The pre-recorded ProcessMaker University Training Portal is a must for anyone who wishes to master ProcessMaker features and maximize the success of a ProcessMaker implementation. (http://university.processmaker.com) – Included in the enterprise license/subscription

Advanced 40-hour Training Course:

The advanced training will provide technical resources with the knowledge to onboard any high level and high complexity requirements of the ProcessMaker solution, this training is detailed as follows:

a.   Part I: Certified Architect Training (24 hours of training delivered as public on site course or private course)

b.    Part II: Plug-in Training for Developers (16 hours of training delivered as public on site course or private course)

c.   Customized Course can be laid-out/designed per customer specific requirements as well.  This alternative would be priced at the same hour/total cost fee.

Do you have an active community around your software?

Do you have a Professional Services organization that supports product and if so, can you please describe your services methodology?

ProcessMaker offers professional services to customers and partners to be sure that their BPM projects are completed on time, under budget, and functioning correctly.  Our dedicated consultants will work with you to implement your workflow requirements.

Our professional services implementation methodology has been developed and refined during these many years to incorporate better communication strategies, better development strategies, and better test and implementation strategies.  Whether we or the customer is automating the process, we advocate the following 5 steps:

●  Choose a project or process that will have significant impact in the organization

●  Clearly identify what success looks like in order to manage expectations

●  Ensure that the correct stakeholders are on the process implementation team for both the vendor and client

●  Design the process

●  Implement iteratively using a SCRUM methodology to ensure timely feedback and adjustments.

This service is available to Enterprise Subscription customers and can be quoted upon request.

Services can be delivered on site, remotely or combined.

There are three ways that customers can engage with ProcessMaker Professional Services:

• Turn Key – We will quote an implementation fee based on the specific workflow or workflows to be automated.  For provision of such quotation, we may require very specific/particular documentation of the targeted process.

• A Statement of Work (SOW / See Annex I) will be created and agreed upon before any work is carried out and this document will become part of the professional services contract between our consultants and the customer.  This can all be carried out either on-site or remotely.

• Project Based –Hire specific project roles (Project Manager, Architect, and Programmer) to complement your existing team.  Choose which parts of your workflow you require assistance with or which team roles you require us to fulfill for your project.   This can be carried out either on-site or remotely.

• Blended Rate Hours Packs – Quoted via a blended rate via hours purchased or hours consumed (Remote Consulting)

1)     Professional Services Methodology

AGILE Project Management and SOW Methodology

The ProcessMaker Consulting team has developed an easy to follow procedure for implementing custom processes in ProcessMaker. The following table presents the methodology used to implement ProcessMaker. It shows the major activities that a project team should follow when implementing a new project or process in ProcessMaker.  Whether the ProcessMaker team, client team, or external consultants are implementing the project, we have found that this methodology offers the highest rate of success. Please note that steps 4-7 are performed using an AGILE methodology.  We recommend that these steps be based on 2 week sprints, daily SCRUMs, and weekly or bi-weekly verifications and checks with the client.  Steps 1-3 are more directional in nature to ensure that everyone understands the ultimate direction of the project/process implementation.

What client platforms is your solution compatible with (web, mobile, etc.)?

1. Is standalone client software required or is it web-based?

   1. If web-based, which web browsers are supported?

   2. Does it support responsive UI?

2. Is mobile app available and on which operating systems?

3. If the functionality differs by client platform, please elaborate how

What operating systems can be used for hosting your solution?

Response:

Our solution is based on a LAMP/WAMP (Linux/Windows, Apache, MySQL and PHP stack). Our currently supported stacks include both Linux (CentOS) and Windows Operating Systems. For more details on our supported stacks, please refer to http://wiki.processmaker.com/index.php/Supported_Stacks.

What other software prerequisites are needed to ensure successful provisioning and operation of your solution? (e.g. database drivers, etc.)

Response:

ProcessMaker requires the following components in order for the software to be successfully installed:

• Apache Web Server with the following components enabled

• Deflate

• Expires

• Rewrite

• Vhost_alias

• Filter (only if using Apache 2.4)

• PHP Runtime language

• Fileinfo

• MySQL

• Xml

• Mbstring

• Mcrypt

• Soap

• LDAP

• GD

• Curl

• CLI

• MySQL

• Strict mode disabled

If connecting to external databases, such as MSSQL or Oracle, additional drivers for the respective database engines would be required.

To see a full list of the required components pre installation, please visit this link: http://wiki.processmaker.com/3.0/ProcessMaker_Installation_Requirements.

Does your solution support horizontal or vertical scaling?

ProcessMaker can support high scalable and high available implementations. We typically only do this for very large ProcessMaker implementations (tens of thousands of users).

For small size implementations (hundreds or low thousands of users), we have server sizing guidelines that are available here: http://wiki.processmaker.com/index.php/ProcessMaker_Server_Sizing

For these types of large and scalable implementations, we have tested thoroughly in the AWS environment and would therefore recommend AWS for a highly scalable requirement, however, we have also tested in the MS Azure cloud and confirm that we are able to offer the same in the MS Azure cloud.

Here is an example diagram detailing a highly scalable and available ProcessMaker implementation in the AWS environment:

What are the known scaling bottlenecks (e.g. CPU/memory/IO, etc.)? What are the recommended hardware requirements?

Response:

ProcessMaker has no specific scaling bottlenecks. Actual bottlenecks experienced by our customers tend to depend on many factors, including processes' complexity, number of users, number of cases, among others.

As for hardware requirements, for personal use and/or testing use, ProcessMaker can be installed on any computer with a modern CPU and 2GB of RAM. For production use, the hardware requirements also vary based on the number of concurrent users, repository size and system configuration. Larger implementations may require some tuning to perform optimally (such tuning can be provided by ProcessMaker Professional Services Team). In any case, for production use, it is recommended that ProcessMaker is installed in a dedicated server or virtual machine, with at least 4 GB RAM, 2 CPU cores and 10 GB free disk space.

For more information on hardware requirements, please refer to: http://wiki.processmaker.com/index.php/ProcessMaker_Server_Sizing. 

What technical support options are provided?

Response:

Different support plans have different SLAs.  All SLAs are managed based on combination of the customer support plan and the criticality of the issue.  

The following table summarizes support characteristics depending on the customer subscription:

As soon as an issue is received, it is placed in a review/assignment queue.  A team of agents will perform the initial review and then assign the support work to be done by a support agent.  Support agents will first review the information received to understand the problem.  The agent will then proceed to reproduce the problem or request additional information in order to reproduce the problem.

Once the problem has been reproduced, if there is not a known solution or if the agent cannot fix it, the problem will then be escalated to an interdepartmental coordinator.  The coordinator will then assign the problem to the engineering cue for resolution.  If the issue will then be prioritized and fixed in a patch release if it requires immediate solution.  If the reported issue is a non-critical issue then it may be fixed in the next scheduled maintenance release. Issues that make it to engineering will be put directly into the engineering backlog to be prioritized in an upcoming release sprint.

Customer communication is prioritized at all times during this process.  All incident information and resolution/escalation times are visible to the client in the trouble ticket system.

Additionally, for SaaS deployments, in case there is a service outage, ProcessMaker´s recovery time objective (“RTO”) is between 4 and 8 hours.

Solution allows for different field types (date, pick-list, radio button, free form, etc.)

Response:

ProcessMaker supports the following variable types: String, integer, float, boolean, datetime, grid, array and file. Variables can be bound to different form controls, including textbox, text area, dropdown, checkbox, checkgroup, radio, datetime, suggest, hidden, files, grid, among others. In addition, Forms designed to be used via the mobile ProcessMaker application can make use of additional input types such as geolocation, QR/bar codes, finger signature via touchscreen, pictures, audio and video.

Can data submitted be modified after it's submission by different users?

In ProcessMaker, supervisors have the ability to edit data based on the pre defined scope by a process architect. So therefore, a supervisor can make data changes at any point in the workflow, as long as he/she has the right access rights to do so for each individual process.

Does the workflow solution have the ability to execute sub processes and how does it work?

ProcessMaker is able to execute processes and sub processes. In ProcessMaker, sub processes retain the same exact level of functionality that a normal process would have. The only thing that is different about a sub process is that they may be invoked from within another process. When invoked, sub processes can be executed synchronously or asynchronously. This means that the parent process can be made to wait until the sub process is finished or continue immediately. If the parent process waits, data can be transfered back to the parent process. If the parent process does not wait, data can only be sent to the sub process.

Is it possible for only developers/administrators to create processes?

Yes, it is possible to permission it so that only developers/administrators can delete the process. In fact, this is the default and recommended setting.

Is it possible for only developers/administrators to delete processes?

Yes, it is possible to permission it so that only developers/administrators can delete the processes. In fact, this is the default and recommended setting.

Can the proposed solution generate MS Word and PDF documents?

ProcessMaker has the ability generate both MS Word and PDF documents. These documents are known as Output Documents in ProcessMaker. Output Documents can be generated through a What You See Is What You Get (WYSIWYG) editor and contain embedded process data so that the output of the document can be dynamic, based upon the workflow that is generating it.

For more information on Output Documents, please see this page: http://wiki.processmaker.com/3.0/Output_Documents