Appian’s Financial Viability and the Future of Low-Code Business Process Management
Appian, a major business process management (BPM) vendor, released its financial statement for the second quarter of 2019. The vendor posted a net $6.6 million loss on the quarter. Despite the lack of profitability, there is a strong outlook for the future of the company and its BPM applications.
- Appian has broken its revenue into two streams: subscriptions, software, and support (SSS) and professional services (PS). The vendor pulled in $39.3 million from SSS, which is up 19% year-over-year. PS revenue grew only 3% but still amounted to $27.7 million.
- Revenue was down this quarter. Appian faced a net loss of $6.6 million. However, this is an improvement from the $8.8 million loss during the second quarter in 2018.
- For the third quarter of 2019, Appian’s leadership team is expecting to generate another $39 million in revenue.
Source: Appian at SoftwareReviews, Report Published 2019
Our Take
Appian’s financial stability makes for a great case study on evaluating vendor viability. When selecting an enterprise application such as a BPM tool, it is important to consider non-functional aspects of the platform in addition to its core features. Financial stability is rarely discussed in the context of vendor evaluations. Your organization must determine how much risk you are willing to take in order to get cutting-edge tools. If a vendor disappears overnight, your organization will not be able to function. However, collaborating with an emerging vendor early will position you to leap ahead of the competition.
Overall, Appian may be posting alarming financial results. However, it appears to be heavily investing in its back end and bolstering development teams. It is likely that Appian is a safe bet for those building a shortlist of low-code BPM vendors.