Siemens Opcenter APS alternative and Preactor replacement for plants without a planning department
ProductionPlanning.ai is a Siemens Opcenter APS alternative for small and mid sized plants that want a finite capacity schedule this week, not an APS project this year. Opcenter APS, sold for decades as Preactor, is a deep scheduling and optimization system that Siemens prices only through sales and partners; the lowest third party figure we found is 20,000 USD per organization before implementation. We load every machine against its real shifts and setups and name the orders that will ship late, from 149 USD per plant a month with unlimited users. Below is an honest comparison, including the plants where Opcenter is the better buy.
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Machine shop, This week's schedule, finite capacity per work center
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Preactor is now Siemens Opcenter APS
Siemens bought Preactor in 2013, sold it as SIMATIC IT Preactor APS, and then folded it into the Opcenter family. Today the scheduling side is sold as Opcenter Scheduling in Standard, Professional and Ultimate editions, with Opcenter Planning for forecast and long term orders and a separate Opcenter Scheduling SMT for electronics assembly. The old 200 FCS, 300 FCS, 400 APS and 500 APS licenses were mapped onto the new editions, and Lean Scheduling International, Siemens' largest North American partner, says legacy licenses had to move to the new structure by October 2022 to keep maintenance. If you still run an old Preactor install, a renewal or migration quote is the natural moment to ask whether you need the full APS at all.
Why plants look for a Siemens Opcenter APS alternative
Opcenter APS has a strong reputation with planners who have the time to model a plant in depth. Smaller plants that go looking for something else usually hit one of these first.
- There is no price on the page. Siemens, Capterra and SoftwareConnect all say pricing is by request. ITQlick puts the start at 20,000 USD per organization, and User Solutions, a rival scheduling vendor, estimates 15,000 to 40,000 USD for an entry license and 75,000 to 150,000 USD for a standard one
- It is a project. A Siemens partner puts a typical implementation at two to six months, and ITQlick estimates 20,000 to 100,000 USD or more for implementation on top of the license
- Maintenance is a percentage. ITQlick quotes 18 to 22 percent of the license fee every year
- The model needs feeding. Opcenter stores its data in a SQL database and imports orders and routings from an ERP, files or spreadsheets, so someone has to own that data flow
- Most of the depth goes unused. A 25 person plant needs late orders flagged and a sequence per machine, not campaign optimization and a configurable database schema
If that list fits your plant, the real choice is between an optimizer that a planning team runs and a scheduler the plant manager can run on Monday.
Siemens Opcenter APS editions and what each one does
These capabilities come from Siemens' own product pages, its partners' datasheets and the SoftwareConnect listing. Siemens publishes no price for any edition.
| Edition | What it does | Where the old Preactor licenses went |
|---|---|---|
| Opcenter Scheduling Standard | Entry level system with an interactive planning board, 30 day trial per SoftwareConnect | 200 FCS and 300 FCS, depending on the license |
| Opcenter Scheduling Professional | The middle edition, the exact feature split is scoped in the quote | 200 FCS and 300 FCS, depending on the license |
| Opcenter Scheduling Ultimate | Optimization rules such as changeover minimization, bottleneck and campaigning, API access, a customizable database schema | 400 APS and 500 APS |
| Opcenter Planning | Forecast and long term order planning | 400 GMPS |
| Opcenter Scheduling SMT | Scheduling for electronics surface mount lines | Not mapped |
| ERP connections named by partners | SAP R/3, SAP S/4HANA, Microsoft Dynamics, Infor, proALPHA | |
| Deployment | Mainly on premise, hybrid and SaaS mentioned on SoftwareConnect |
It is a serious product. The question for a small plant is whether it needs that much model, and that much project, to stop shipping late.
Siemens Opcenter APS vs ProductionPlanning.ai, side by side
| What matters | ProductionPlanning.ai | Siemens Opcenter APS |
|---|---|---|
| What it is | Finite capacity production scheduling software in the browser | Advanced planning and scheduling system, mainly on premise |
| Published price | Yes, on the pricing page | No, quote through Siemens or a partner |
| Entry price | 149 USD per plant a month | ITQlick lists a start of 20,000 USD per organization |
| Users | Unlimited on every plan | Licensed through the quote |
| Implementation | None, import a spreadsheet and run | Two to six months per a Siemens partner, 20,000 to 100,000 USD per ITQlick |
| Annual maintenance | Included in the subscription | 18 to 22 percent of the license per ITQlick |
| Finite capacity on every machine and shift | Yes | Yes |
| Multi constraint, machine plus operator plus tool | Machines, shifts and setups | Yes, a core strength since the Preactor 300 FCS days |
| Optimization rules and campaigns | Sequencing rules compared before publishing, grouping by product family on Plant | Yes, extensive on Ultimate |
| Late order warnings | Projected finish date for every order | Yes |
| Best for | 5 to 60 person plants that ship late and want the schedule fixed now | Plants with a planner or planning team and an ERP to feed the model |
Every Opcenter figure in this table is attributed to the listing or partner that published it. Our plans and limits are on the pricing page.
What Opcenter APS costs next to a flat per plant price
Take one plant with 25 people, one planner and a plant manager who both need the schedule, and operators who need to read it.
| Cost line | Siemens Opcenter APS, third party estimates | ProductionPlanning.ai |
|---|---|---|
| License or subscription, year one | From 20,000 USD per ITQlick, 15,000 to 40,000 USD entry and 75,000 to 150,000 USD standard per User Solutions | 894 USD on Line, 2,574 USD on Plant, paid yearly |
| Implementation | 20,000 to 100,000 USD or more per ITQlick | None |
| Maintenance from year two | 18 to 22 percent of the license each year | Included |
| Operators and sales who only read the plan | Depends on the quote | Included |
| Time to first published schedule | Two to six months per a Siemens partner | An afternoon |
None of the Opcenter figures is a Siemens quote, and a partner may well beat them. The point of the table is the shape: a license plus a project plus a yearly percentage, against one flat subscription. The full arithmetic over three years is in Preactor pricing and Siemens Opcenter APS cost.
Where Siemens Opcenter APS is the better choice
We would rather you buy the right system. Choose Opcenter APS if any of these applies.
- You schedule against several constraints at once, machine, operator, tooling and material, and each one really limits the plant
- You run sequence dependent changeovers or campaigns where optimization rules are worth real money, as in packaging, chemicals, food or plastics
- You have a planner or a planning team, and a partner to model the plant and keep the model current
- You run SAP, Microsoft Dynamics or Infor and want the schedule to read from it and write back to it
- You need an API and your own database schema to build reporting around the schedule
For a mid size or large manufacturer with those needs, Opcenter has decades of scheduling work behind it, a large partner network in North America and Siemens behind the product.
Where a dedicated scheduler for small plants wins
- A published price, 149 USD per plant a month on Line and 429 USD on Plant, with monthly plans you can cancel
- Unlimited users, so the planner, shift leads, operators and sales see the same plan without a seat count
- Finite capacity on every machine and shift, holidays and maintenance windows included, on every plan
- Projected finish dates for every open order, and the week's bottleneck named with the jobs it will make late
- Setup times per product family and automatic grouping of similar jobs on Plant
- Runs in the browser next to QuickBooks, a small ERP or a spreadsheet, with no server to install and no model to build first
The clearest fit is a plant that has outgrown the whiteboard but does not have a planning department. See the queue per machine on machine scheduling software, and how we compare with other APS tools on advanced planning and scheduling software and our PlanetTogether alternative.
How to move from Preactor or Opcenter to a simpler schedule
1. Export open orders and routings
Export open orders with product, quantity and due date, and the operations with setup and run times, from Opcenter, your ERP or the spreadsheet that feeds it. Plant imports a spreadsheet directly.
2. Enter work centers and shifts
Add a work center per machine, line or cell with its shifts, holidays and maintenance windows. For a 20 machine plant this usually takes about an hour.
3. Run the schedule next to the old one
Run both for a week. Compare the late order list and the bottleneck against what Opcenter shows. If they agree, you know the simpler schedule is enough for your plant.
4. Decide before the renewal
Keep Opcenter where its constraints really matter, or let the maintenance lapse at renewal. Either way, the plant floor sees the plan on any screen without a license.
Questions people ask before choosing Siemens Opcenter APS
What is the best alternative to Siemens Opcenter APS?
It depends on plant size. Enterprise buyers usually compare Opcenter APS with PlanetTogether and other APS suites. For a 5 to 60 person plant without a planning team, a dedicated finite capacity scheduler fits better and costs far less: ProductionPlanning.ai starts at 149 USD per plant a month with unlimited users. Our best production scheduling software roundup compares eleven tools with real prices.
How much does Siemens Opcenter APS cost?
Siemens does not publish pricing, and Capterra and SoftwareConnect list it as by request. ITQlick puts the start at 20,000 USD per organization, with 20,000 to 100,000 USD or more for implementation and 18 to 22 percent a year in maintenance. A rival vendor estimates 15,000 to 40,000 USD for an entry license. Ask a partner for a written quote.
Is Preactor still available?
Yes, under a new name. Preactor is now sold as Siemens Opcenter APS, with Opcenter Scheduling Standard, Professional and Ultimate and Opcenter Planning. Old 200 FCS, 300 FCS, 400 APS and 500 APS licenses were mapped onto those editions, and a North American partner says legacy licenses had to migrate by October 2022 to keep maintenance.
What is the difference between Preactor 300 FCS and 400 APS?
300 FCS is multi constraint finite capacity scheduling: an operation is loaded only when the machine, the operator and the tool are all free. 400 APS adds optimization rules on top, such as minimizing changeovers, scheduling to the bottleneck and campaigning. In today's lineup 400 APS maps to Opcenter Scheduling Ultimate.
Does Opcenter APS integrate with SAP?
Yes. Siemens partners name SAP R/3 and SAP S/4HANA among the ERPs Opcenter APS connects to, along with Microsoft Dynamics, Infor and proALPHA. It can also import from files and spreadsheets, but someone has to own that data flow. ProductionPlanning.ai needs no ERP and imports open orders from a spreadsheet.
How long does an Opcenter APS implementation take?
A Siemens partner puts a typical implementation at two to six months, covering data import, modelling the plant's constraints and training the planners. Larger rollouts with several plants and optimization rules take longer. A per plant scheduler that imports a spreadsheet can publish its first schedule the same afternoon.
Get a finite capacity schedule this week, for a flat price per plant
Start on the Line plan at 149 USD a month with the whole plant included, or run the demo on a sample week of orders first. You will see your own bottleneck the same afternoon.
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