Should you build or buy Process & Task Mining?
Process and task mining software reconstructs how work actually happens by analyzing event logs from ERP, CRM, and desktop systems, surfacing bottlenecks, conformance gaps, and automation candidates without interviewing staff about their workflow. Buyers are operations, finance, and transformation teams trying to see a process as it runs, not as documented.
Buy the platform whose packaged SAP or ERP extraction matches your systems and scope the contract to the processes you will actually mine, since Celonis spend scales with use cases and terms are non-cancelable. A data team with an existing warehouse and one or two bounded processes can reasonably build on PM4Py, but only with a named owner for extraction, data quality and dashboards.
Build it, buy it, or bridge?
When building makes sense
Open-source tools cover the algorithmic core credibly. PM4Py handles object-centric event logs, alignments, and conformance checking; ProM adds OCEL plug-ins; bupaR provides rule-based conformance analysis. But the documented real-data cases are research engagements, not production systems: e.GO Mobile's manufacturing log of 116 cars and just over 12,000 events was analyzed with ProM and PM4Py as a study, and a 2025 design combining PM4Py with a graph database and a local LLM for conversational mining is a research architecture, not a deployed product. None of these is a continuously operated in-house system replacing a commercial platform, and PM4Py's own documentation assumes your team has already solved extraction, the hard, unglamorous part of connecting to SAP or another ERP. A data team with an existing warehouse and one or two genuinely bounded processes can build credibly on PM4Py, but only with someone explicitly owning extraction, data quality, and dashboards as an ongoing job.
When buying makes sense
Buying is the stronger case for most organizations. Independent comparisons of the major process mining platforms find that most, including Celonis, SAP Signavio, UiPath, and ARIS, are quote-based, with cost tied to data volume, modules, or negotiated enterprise terms rather than a fixed number you can budget from a website. Complex, multi-SKU pricing that is hard to predict at scale is a named limitation of the market leader in independent vendor comparisons. No single mining capability here is exclusive to one vendor — extraction, conformance checking, and dashboards are available across Celonis, Signavio, UiPath, ARIS, and Apromore's commercial edition. Scope the purchase tightly to the processes you'll actually mine, get quotes from at least two vendors given how opaque list pricing is, and remember that the biggest hidden cost either way, event-log extraction, commonly runs three to six months regardless of which platform you choose.
The desk read
Build-versus-buy analysis for Process & Task Mining is being written. In the meantime, the framework that drives every B4 call is on the B4 Index page.
Frequently asked
Can you build process mining in-house with open-source tools?
The algorithmic core, yes. PM4Py and ProM handle alignments and conformance checking credibly. What's missing is a documented continuously operated production system; the real-data cases found are research engagements, and PM4Py assumes extraction from SAP or your ERP is already solved, which is the hard part.
Why is process mining pricing so hard to compare?
Because most vendors don't publish it. Independent comparisons find that most major platforms, including Celonis and SAP Signavio, are quote-based and scale with data volume, modules, or negotiated terms rather than a listed rate. Get quotes from multiple vendors before assuming any number you read online.
What are the main process mining vendors?
Representative vendors include Apromore, SAP Signavio Process Intelligence. B4 Pro includes the category score and the full vendor list.