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Windchill vs Arbortext

Last Updated: November 18th, 2024

Our analysts compared Windchill vs Arbortext based on data from our 400+ point analysis of PLM Software, user reviews and our own crowdsourced data from our free software selection platform.

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Product Basics

Windchill is a product lifecycle management and supply chain system that utilizes the latest developments in technology to optimize operations. Automation and AR capabilities are some of the modern technologies that can be included in the system. The program increases the visibility of product concepts as they move throughout the lifecycle by collecting real-time CAD data.

Its automation capabilities also allow for changes made downstream to be reflected in other areas, such as in technical documents and promotional materials. These changes can also be reflected in graphical representations of a product to ensure accuracy. Windchill works to reduce duplicate work and communication errors as a product moves throughout the lifecycle.

PTC Arbortext is an end-to-end publishing and content authoring solution designed to help manufacturing organizations streamline the delivery of technical publications. It allows users to maintain a digital thread of dynamic data to boost consistency with real-time synchronization and a single source of data truth.

Users can create high-quality content by writing XML documents and creating stylesheets, complete with 2D and 3D illustrations. Automation capabilities include auto-generating content, automating publishing, formatting and printing. It also supports multi-channel delivery and multi-language formatting.

$1,000/User, Monthly

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$700/Seat, One-Time

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Product Insights

Increased Visibility: Look at products as they move from one aspect of the lifecycle to another. Components of this include the ability to look at quality aspects and feature changes.
Boost in Productivity: Boosts productivity among workers. Centralization and a single view of data can reduce the amount of time that employees spend looking for information.
Use the Latest Tech: Can integrate with Vuforia, an AR tool. This allows users to look at their designs in a real-world setting and to use that information to inform aspects of a product. As technology advances and more features become available, it can be helpful to stay up-to-date on the latest and greatest tools.
Reduced Costs: Cost is an essential factor to consider when looking at different software solutions. Reduces costs through the efficient creation of product variants, which is typically time-consuming and costly.
Automation: Leverages automation to help update content and users as features and definitions are altered. This ensures consistency and reliability of information.

Improve Productivity: Save time with reusable XML component-based content and automated formatting. Minimize programming by creating, updating and simplifying stylesheet creation.
Simplify Content Management: Gain a single source of truth for all your technical documentation. Centralize stylesheets, layouts, formatting, and service and product information, eliminating scattered information and streamlining your content lifecycle.
Enhance Technical Content Quality: Deliver error-free documentation by enforcing stylesheets that automate information layout and delivery. Improve content reusability, enforce style guides and ensure regulatory compliance with approved information.
Increase Automation: Minimize manual tasks by automating publishing processes, formatting, layout tasks, and the delivery of multi-channel and multi-language service and product information.
Reduce Publishing Production Costs: Develop a single source for styling criteria and formats to eliminate disparities and rework from multiple stylesheets, languages and document types. Minimize the costs of distributing and printing paper copies of product information.

Product Design and Visualization With AR: Offers integration with Vuforia, an augmented reality (AR) platform. Design 2D and 3D objects not only on a screen, but also in a real-world setting. Collaborate with others across the world on these designs.
Change Management: The change management can make alterations during the product life cycle in a centralized location so that other users can access the most up-to-date information. This tool also provides visibility of how change impacts an organization throughout the product life cycle.
Product Quality Monitoring: Integrates quality measures into product development. This allows employees to see what type of quality issues occur and to work to solve them for future and ongoing iterations of a product.
BOM Management: Digital Bill of Materials (BOM) is provided through this system. A parts-centric approach to BOM is available with a single source of truth for all organizational product data. This program is closed-loop throughout the entire lifecycle from conceptualization to product release.
Product Variation: Developing a product variation can be time-consuming and expensive. This system works to assist in the complete production process of product variants to ensure customer satisfaction and cost-effectiveness.
Unified Data: Windchill centralizes data from multiple aspects of a business into a single view to make access easier and less time-consuming. Real-time CAD and product data are some of the sources included in this feature.
Automatic Content Updates: When changes are made to a product during the development phase, Windchill allows for the automatic update of content in accordance with these changes. This tool can also manage content that is gathered from multiple sources.

Content Creation: Use the editor to create standardized content for multiple media formats. Auto-generate text using language-specific collation rules. Incorporate editable, intelligent graphics and embed 2D and 3D animation or illustrations in web and interactive content.
Structured Editor: Simplify technical content creation with word-processing capabilities like change tracking, drag-and-drop editing and keyboard macros.
Real-time CAD Data: Gather and use real-time CAD data to develop illustrations and animations more quickly. Ensure product information and graphics are accurate with IsoDraw’s ability to update objects and change specifications throughout the production cycle. Create output in multiple data formats including raster graphics, 2D, 3D and animations.
Automated Document Creation: Automate formatting and document layouts prior to publication with the Advanced Print Publisher tool. Minimize time spent manually editing graphics, text and other features in formats including XML, JPG, GIF, CGM and SVG.
Stylesheet Creation: Create stylesheets with the styler tool, which allows users to develop a set of standards and rules across stylesheets. Ensure content and product quality and consistency along the product lifecycle in multiple layouts and languages.
Multichannel Content Delivery: Generate one or more different types of dynamic output simultaneously to multiple formats. Take single-source content and publish it across multiple channels.
Multi-Language Formatting: Export generated text as a separate file to translate and create multi-language stylesheets. Increase reusability by using multiple numbering schemes to meet regional numbering rules and mirroring page layout definitions for right-to-left languages.

Product Ranking

#2

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#9

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Analyst Rating Summary

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User Sentiment Summary

78%

of users recommend this product

Windchill has a 'good' User Satisfaction Rating of 78% when considering 112 user reviews from 4 recognized software review sites.

84%

of users recommend this product

Arbortext has a 'great' User Satisfaction Rating of 84% when considering 26 user reviews from 2 recognized software review sites.

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4.2 (25)

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Awards

Synopsis of User Ratings and Reviews

Integrations: All reviewers who mentioned integrations said that the system has robust integration options with a helpful set of integrated tools.

Functionality: Approximately 90% of users who talked about the system’s overall functionality noted that its suite of features and automation tools were stable and capable of handling critical daily processes.

Searching Tools: About 66% of reviewers who referred to search features noted that they were intuitive and helped find specific documents quickly.

Improved Collaboration: Foster seamless collaboration across engineering and design with manufacturing and marketing departments. The centralized platform eliminates information silos and ensures everyone has access to updated product data, reducing communication errors and delays.

Enhanced Product Quality: Facilitate a controlled and standardized approach to product development with features like change order tracking and revision control. Real-time updates ensure everyone is working on the latest version of product specifications, minimizing the risk of errors and improving overall product quality.

Streamlined Supply Chain Management: Integrate with supplier databases and other supply chain management tools to improve communication and coordination with suppliers, leading to more efficient procurement processes and faster time-to-market.

Ease of Use: Nearly 60% of reviewers who mentioned the system’s usability noted that the system required a steep learning curve with training requirements to master.

Support: Complicated issues took long periods of time to solve, with the overall support process being hit or miss, according to all reviewers who mentioned support.

Customization: All users that talked about customization said that customizing the system wasn’t easy and there wasn’t much room for customization in the first place.

Complex Implementation: Implementing a PLM system can be complex and time-consuming. Businesses need to invest time in data migration, user training and system configuration to ensure a smooth transition.

High Initial Investment: The cost of PLM software is not as cheap as chips, especially for larger companies with complex product lifecycles. Licensing fees, implementation costs and ongoing maintenance charges can add up quickly.

Data Migration: Migrating existing product data from legacy systems to a new PLM platform opens a whole new can of worms. Incomplete or dirty data or inconsistent formatting can lead to problems down the road, so data quality and consistency require careful attention during migration.

Windchill’s PLM and supply chain management features are robust and help optimize and streamline daily operations. Powerful integrations with popular applications like CAD boost efficiency and add value to the product as a whole. Its automation features help users overcome manual tasks and streamline their tasks. While its features are impressive, it required significant time and training investments to familiarize users with the system. Customization options are available, but customizations were hard to implement without help. Support was often described as slow, especially when more complex problems occurred. Some reviewers also mentioned that the monthly maintenance costs were on the high side.

PTC Arbortext is a content authoring tool designed to streamline the creation, management and delivery of technical documentation. Its focus on reusability through XML components and automated formatting helps users save time and reduce errors. Additionally, it centralizes product information and enforces stylesheets to ensure consistency across various media formats.Beyond core content creation functionalities, it offers features like real-time CAD data integration, automated document creation and multi-channel content delivery. While pricing isn't publicly advertised, it likely follows a tiered licensing structure based on required features. Overall, it offers organizations an effective way to optimize technical content creation and delivery and maintain a digital thread.

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FAQ

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