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Arena QMS
Cloud-based quality and compliance management software
Last updated: August 2024
Rating criteria
Reviews by rating
MasterControl Quality Excellence
QT9 QMS
ETQ Reliance
Recommended
Brian S.
Oil & Energy, 501-1,000 employees
Used daily for 6-12 months
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Arena overall provides many features that are extremely useful for a Quality Management System. The features and interactions between the different systems and Worlds available are the key to establishing our QMS.
Moving our change control and corrective action processes from other systems into Arena has been a game changer. The risk of losing records has been reduced dramatically. The workflow status of both the change control and corrective action processes provides the needed visibility for our organization.
Some of the user functionality is not intuitive which makes navigation of the system by part-time users challenging.
Thank you for taking the time to review Arena QMS, Brian! We're happy you find the system overall useful and that it's helped your organization better manage changes and corrective actions.
Nate F.
Electrical/Electronic Manufacturing, 501-1,000 employees
Used daily for 1-2 years
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I like that I can search whatever product I need to understand and see all documentation tied to it. I also enjoy the traceability of said documentation for doing investigations for failure analysis.
When searching an item number, I dislike needing to select the type of thing I'm looking for. I usually look for drawings and ECOs, and a minor thing is when I go between the two it will yield an empty search result, even though both documents I am searching have unique IDs.
Hi Nate, thank you for taking the time to leave Arena QMS! We're glad that our solution has helped boost traceability at your organization.
Courtney F.
Medical Devices, 51-200 employees
Used daily for 6-12 months
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Big improvement from our previous QMS system, smooth implementation from user perspective. Look forward to learning more about Arena.
It's breadth of capabilities, customizing of Dashboard, ability to save search filters.
Not auto-populating in Dashboard fields. I.E. if you click into "Training", only recently visited Trainings appear, not necessarily all that are outstanding for the user.
Hi Courtney, thank you for taking the time to leave us a review! We're glad that you've found Arena QMS to be an improvement from your previous QMS system.
PETER C.
Biotechnology, 1,001-5,000 employees
Used daily for 2+ years
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Arena QMS has all the features we need for quality management. I like the functionality and integration across our various different locations and product lines.
Could be more intuitive and user-friendly. Can get confusing and convoluted at times.
Hi Peter, thank you for leaving us a review! We're glad Arena QMS covers all the features you need for quality management.
Anita L.
Medical Devices, 51-200 employees
Used daily for 1-2 years
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We like the BOM management. When something in the BOM changes, it's easy to track.
Document Management and Cost. It can be expensive
Hi Anita. thank you for reviewing Arena QMS. We appreciate your perspective on the cost and document management capabilities of Arena QMS and are glad you're enjoying the ease of BOM management it provides.
Maya F.
Medical Devices, 11-50 employees
Used daily for 1-2 years
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I like it a lot! I haven't had much experience with other QMS systems but Arena was mostly intuitive and I've helped improve our company's utilization of the various features.
I like the ease of adding items to/from DCOs, implementing changes, document storage, and item creation.
Adding items to BOMs should be the same mechanism as adding to DCOs (can input multiple search queries then add all to BOM) some functions are harder to find intuitively (import/export functions or certain comparisons) so more free resources for workers on more advanced Arena activities would be great.
Hi Maya, thank you for letting us know more about your experience with Arena QMS! We're glad it's been intuitive so far and hope you continue to realize the benefits of using our solution.
Saikiran G.
Mechanical or Industrial Engineering, 201-500 employees
Used daily for 2+ years
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All documentation in one platform, Sorting and searching made easy
Work order and material sync up with other platforms is a problem and hassle to deal with
Hi Saikiran, Thank you for taking the time to review Arena QMS. Your feedback about the work order and material sync up is helpful, and we'll share this with the team. We're glad to hear that you've benefitted from the platform!
Paul P.
Biotechnology, 51-200 employees
Used daily for 6-12 months
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I've enjoyed using the system for our needs.
I appreciate the wide array of accessibility features for quality management.
I'd like more options available on home screens prior to being "recently used" items. Also, sometimes the search feature doesn't reset after going back to the home screen and uses the previous search word.
Hi Paul, Thank you for reviewing Arena QMS. We're glad it's been an efficient system to use for your organization and appreciate your feedback on our search feature.
Daniel L.
Biotechnology, 201-500 employees
Used daily for 2+ years
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I am very satisfied with the App on general as it is very easy to use and is able to provide the information that i am required to use. I would highly recommend this to other company's as it is the easiest App i have ever used.
The ease of use of this App makes finding a following directions very easy. I am able to find what i need easily with the use of the search button that allows me to be able to type in a description and find what I'm looking for.
While using the software at times I am automatically logged out or the App will crash causing me to have to re login and either look for my last page or use some time waiting for it to log in.
Hi Daniel, Thank you for taking the time to leave us a review. We're glad Arena QMS has been easy to use and appreciate your feedback about the app crashing. We will bring this up with our internal team.
Nancy T.
Semiconductors, 5,001-10,000 employees
Used daily for 2+ years
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I do not have any business problems with Arena. The benefit is huge since Arena helps us to manage our releases.
It is very friendly user. You can help first time user or you can use Arena even you have not use it for 1 year.
Integrate with other tools. IT department need to get involve during the integration of Arena with other tools like SAP.
Hi Nancy, Thank you for leaving a review of Arena QMS! We're glad it's been user friendly and easy to use.
Mark H.
Medical Devices, 51-200 employees
Used daily for 2+ years
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The implementation took about 12 weeks. But the bigger challenge is getting all users to buy into the process. T
The Quality module and Product lifecycle management has been critical to our successful implementation.
Uploading data into Arena can take a while without proper guidance. We uploaded thousands of documents but bulk uploads would cause errors during import due to human error.
Hi Mark, Thank you for taking the time to leave us a review! We're glad that you found more functionality with our product and still find enjoy using it with your current company.
Clarke M.
Medical Devices, 11-50 employees
Used daily for 2+ years
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Positive experience with the system that has maintained our quality control and compliance to meet increasing external compliance demands with MDR and FDA compliance.
The set up and validation management process are not burdensome as the software is validated but configurable. This helps reduce the compliance management burden of the system while allowing us to customize and add fields as needed.
There are almost no process flows/logic gates in the system. I have not used a system before that does not allow, for example, an open-field text box to appear when an "Other" option is selected. This can lead to some burdensome workflows with lots of fields that are only applicable in certain circumstances.
Hi Clarke, Thank you for leaving us a review! We're glad that you've found value in our configurability. We also appreciate your feedback regarding process flows and logic and will share with the team.
Jessica M.
Information Technology and Services, 51-200 employees
Used daily for 1-2 years
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My customer is able to notify me of process changes and updates easily, and we are able to gather the necessary details and implement changes.
Arena QMS is very user friendly for non-technical users. It is easy to locate items, changes and such with the powerful search tool provided. I enjoy the user interface.
It seems like BOM searches time out and take a long time during busy times of day.
Hi Jessica, Thank you for leaving us a review. We appreciate your input about the BOM search and will bring this to our team for review. We're also happy to hear it's been user friendly and hope it continues to help your organization find efficiencies.
Paul S.
Medical Devices, self-employed
Used daily for 2+ years
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Has worked well for contract manufacturers. Ease to keep multiple clients defined
Arena BOM management and change control are outstanding.
Reporting. No out of the box dashboard. Analytics is not intuitive.
Hi Paul, Thanks for taking the time to leave us a review. We appreciate your feedback regarding analytics and reporting and will share with our team to consider for future enhancements. We're happy to hear you've benefitted from our BOM management and change control capabilities.
Julien C.
Medical Devices, 1-10 employees
Used daily for 2+ years
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This is a huge tool to use for the product and regulatory requirements compliance and especially to prove this compliance to the authorities.
The configuration possibilities that allows to complies with a Quality Management System.The compliance to the FDA requirements for records management, electronic signatures etc...
To improve the follow up of the actions, it should be useful to follow tasks individually in quality processes. e.g. Corrective and Preventives Actions
Hi Julien, Thanks for taking the time to leave us a review! We appreciate hearing your experience with our solution and are glad it's been helpful for your company.
Kapil K.
Electrical/Electronic Manufacturing, 11-50 employees
Used daily for 2+ years
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We enjoy using Arena at Hitachi, and it has been immensely helpful.
Easy to use for ECOs and many other features. It helps to have access with various functions so that everyone can get the information in one place. Integration to SAP is great.
Nothing is really too bad about Arena. We have not had many issues with it.
Hi Kapil, Thank you for reviewing Arena QMS! We're pleased to hear our solution has been helpful and that you haven't encountered many issues. Please do not hesitate to reach out to your account team if you do run into anything.
Ed E.
Research, 11-50 employees
Used daily for 2+ years
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If I could make one overall recommendation it would be I wish our Arena implementing team was more *forceful* with best practice uses. A team that no longer is with the company made a number of decisions that ended up causing a lot of trouble (for me specifically, as the admin/quality rep) in the future.
It is modular to our needs and we have built it to suit thoseneeds *relatively* well. The Arena team is active and responsive to suggestions and reports.
Some thing are janky in how you how to go about it (such as yearly document review and tracking, calibrated item tracking, training that isn't "read and understand", etc).
Hello Ed, Thank you for taking the time to leave us a review! We're glad to hear more about your experience and appreciate your feedback about document tracking, item tracking and training – we'll share this with the internal team to help strategize future enhancements.
Amy J.
Consumer Electronics, 5,001-10,000 employees
Used daily for 2+ years
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Arena has been a great tool for eliminating silos in product development. Everyone has access to the same information, in the same location.
The product is so easy to use. Even from the Admin side setting up and use Arena QMS is pretty easy
Consistency across the Arena worlds for loading files and not being to add suppliers to product changes in bulk, but other than that, I can complain.
Hi Amy, Thank you for taking the time to review Arena QMS! We're pleased to hear that our solution continues to eliminate silos and be easy to use for your company. We appreciate your feedback about file loading and adding suppliers in bulk and will remember this for future enhancements.
Verified reviewer
Medical Devices, 51-200 employees
Used daily for 2+ years
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Arena QMS, with its features and being cloud based, is a powerful tool to manage all the Company documents and allows streamlining the Documents and Change Control processes.
The possible customization, the document storage and the approval process control.
The tool is not immediate to use and sometime the user interface is not so easy. Sometime the updates of the UI get the users confuse.
Thank you for taking the time to leave us a review! We're happy to hear Arena QMS has helped you streamline documents and change control processes. Thank you for sharing your feedback about the user interface. We'll make sure to account for this in future product enhancements.
Elizabeth H.
Biotechnology, 51-200 employees
Used daily for 1-2 years
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By far the most lasting impression about this software is the profound lack of customer service. It was difficult to get ahold of customer service and the communication coming from the Arena team was unclear. They were so difficult to work with.
The most useful feature of the software is the ability to assign users to "roles" which allow for proxy reviewers and approvers.
The software is limited in some key functions for my organization. Primarily, the software lacks analytical capabilities. The system is also slow and will not allow more than one window to be open at a time. This made reviewing and comparing records difficult and slow.
Hello Elizabeth, Thank you for your review of Arena QMS. We're sorry to hear about your experience with customer service. We strive to ensure a positive customer experience. Your concern has been shared with the team. Please reach out to your customer success coach at any time to assist you.
Verified reviewer
Machinery, 51-200 employees
Used daily for 2+ years
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We are able to manage change across a multinational organization with ease
Having a centralized document control system is extremely important to product engineering companies. Arena creates the one source of truth where everyone can find the released documents and their related histories.
The UI has improved greatly over the last year or so, with a new search feature and a drag and drop document upload. There are still some improvements I'd like to see, specifically with the spacing of different sections. There is a lot of empty space on some screens.
Thank you for giving us a 5-star review. We appreciate your feedback and are happy to learn about your positive experience with Arena QMS.
Radhika S.
Automotive, 501-1,000 employees
Used daily for 2+ years
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User friendly and easy to understand. Sourcing information helps collect the data smoothly and accurately.
Arena adds one part at a time in the Bill of Material tab section. This consumes a lot of user time. There is not a good interface with the Oracle system, since it does not account revision when its revised in Arena
Hello Radhika, Thank you for your positive review of Arena QMS. We're glad you find it friendly and easy to understand. Please reach out to your customer success coach to discuss adding parts. They may have a solution for you.
Holly W.
Medical Devices, 51-200 employees
Used daily for 1-2 years
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My experience with Arena has been fantastic so far. They aim to please and are improving the product all the time.
Because we rolled out Arena for Doc Control, QMS, Training, etc all at once, it was the first time I've seen a eQMS work well together. I love the integration of all the components and "worlds" and that once you understand the logic, it's very intuitive.
We have not been able to create reports out of Arena to get the Quality metrics that we'd like. That may be partly because we haven't put the correct fields in. The good news is that it is easy to download data into Excel and manipulate the data from there. Arena is very good responding to requests, so it is improving all the time.
Hello Holly, Thank you for your 5-star review of Arena QMS. We appreciate your feedback. We're happy to hear you had such a positive experience implementing Arena QMS and that it's the first time you've "seen an eQMS work well together"! Please reach out to your customer success coach at any time for support with reports.
Bo J.
Consumer Electronics, 51-200 employees
Used daily for 2+ years
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Overall the software has been very useful to our company and the customer service has been outstanding. Arena gives the customers the ability to customize workflow and also listens to the voices of the customers when releasing new updates.
ARENA is a very user friendly platform and easy to navigate. It has made it easy for our company to create, document, and maintain Bill of Materials and show visibility to those in our company, as well as third party suppliers/contract manufacturers. Requests and Changes are easily created and implemented.
The user interface itself looks a little outdated. Some of the integrations aren't exactly what was desired. Even with the Third party integrations, there is a good bit of backend, manual entry to be done.
Hi Bo, Thank you for your review of Arena QMS. We appreciate your feedback. Glad to hear Arena has been helpful for your company and you're happy with our customer service. You noted in the cons section that UI is a little outdated. As you know we've been updating the UI with a fresh, clean look. We have a commitment to improving user experience. -Alaine
Roget R.
Automotive, 51-200 employees
Used daily for 2+ years
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For a decade and a half the various modules and services of Arena PLM have been at the hub of my engineering activities. At multiple companies and across several industries this software has been able to deliver powerful, enterprise level cloud-based lifecycle management solutions in a reliable and user friendly manner, and I am amazed by the quality of support. As far as I'm concerned, Arena is one of my core suites in ANY venture, the one quantity I can depend on because it just *works*.
The sheer flexibility and ease of use, combined with a low barrier to entry and learning curve. Combine that with both desktop and mobile accessibility and you have a best-in-class offering.
There are a couple of feature enhancements that I've been waiting for a while now, but I also recognize that 1) there are workarounds for those missing elements that are functional, just not pretty and 2) Arena support has shown a clear track record of listening and responding to customer feedback, so I'm fairly confident I'll see those new addons someday.