AlignX
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For the application portfolio manager

Right applications. Lower cost. Less risk. More value.

Applications, components, interfaces, contracts and controls in one model, so tolerate, invest, migrate or eliminate is a decision on the record with the evidence beside it.

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In one sentence

AlignX gives the application portfolio manager every application with its cost, risk, lifecycle and business value in one view, ready for a rationalisation decision that can be defended.

Written forApplication Portfolio ManagerDigital Strategy Director

The challenge

The questions the executive team will ask you.

  1. How many applications do we have, and do we need them all?
  2. Which applications should we retain, consolidate, replace or retire?
  3. Which critical systems are approaching end of support?
  4. What does the application portfolio actually cost us?
  5. What major licence renewals and replacements are coming?
  6. If nothing changes, what risk will we be carrying in three years?

If any of these takes a week to answer, the rest of this page is for you.

The solution

What the portfolio manager keeps current.

TIME matrix

The estate sorted by fit, coloured by the call you made.

Twenty-four applications placed on functional against technical fit. Banner Student Legacy and Legacy Print Manager sit in the unreasonable corner; Azure DevOps and Canvas LMS in the healthy one.

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Technical fit

Unreasonable, inappropriate, adequate, fully appropriate, per component.

Hosting, single sign-on state and provider next to the fit, so the rationalisation case reads off the register.

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Contracts and providers

Which contract sits behind each application, and who provides it.

Alma Library Platform Subscription, Allocate+ Timetabling Licence, Adobe Enterprise Term Licence. The contract register, by provider and category.

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Day to day

What changes.

Without AlignXWith AlignX
The inventoryA spreadsheet from March that nobody trusts.
The inventoryThe register is where the work happens, so it is current.
The rationalisation workshopA day of sticky notes, then a deck.
The rationalisation workshopFit, cost, criticality and contract on every application; the case reads off the register.
The cost questionLicence cost lives in procurement, usage lives in IT.
The cost questionThe contract behind the application, on its record.
The retirementInterfaces discovered in the outage.
The retirementWhat dies with it is on the register before the decision.
The compliance questionWhich applications run which controls? A survey.
The compliance questionControls on the component, with their state.
The duplicateThree CRMs found by accident.
The duplicateSubtype, capability and provider on the register; duplicates are a filter.

The AlignX technology

Nothing new to govern.

  • Runs inside Microsoft 365In your tenant, on your Dataverse. Nothing leaves it.
  • Entra ID governs who sees whatThe roles you already run decide access. No second directory.
  • Australian data residencyYour Dataverse environment sits in an Australian region. Purview and retention policies apply as they do everywhere else.

How AlignX sits inside Microsoft 365

Questions

What application portfolio managers ask us.

What APM, EA and CMDB tools does AlignX replace or integrate with?

AlignX replaces standalone APM tools (LeanIX APM and similar), consolidates the APM and EA disciplines into one platform, and integrates with your CMDB (ServiceNow and Jira Service Management) for CI-level data. You get application, capability, risk, cost and lifecycle context in one place, drawing from the systems that already own the raw data.

Does moving to AlignX let us retire our standalone APM and EA tool?

For most organisations, yes. AlignX handles the full application portfolio lifecycle plus enterprise architecture in one platform. Standalone APM and EA tool licences (typically 80k to 400k AUD combined) come out of the estate. Consolidation usually funds the AlignX platform on its own.

How does AlignX help me rationalise a portfolio when no one owns half the applications?

Every application gets a record with owner, business criticality, cost, risk and lifecycle stage, sourced from CMDB, SSO logs and finance data. Where ownership is unclear, AlignX flags it and runs a discovery workflow to nominate an owner. Orphans stop being invisible.

Can I run TIME (Tolerate, Invest, Migrate, Eliminate) or 6R assessments in AlignX?

Yes, both natively. You can also run custom assessment frameworks. Assessments produce a portfolio disposition view that feeds directly into investment decisions and the delivery portfolio, so a \"Migrate\" decision becomes an actual project, not a sticky note.

How does AlignX handle application cost, risk and business value in one view?

Cost from finance, risk from your risk register, business value from the capabilities each app supports, all on the same record. You can view the portfolio by any of them, or by combinations (high cost, low value, high risk). This is the view that gets rationalisation decisions made.

What does the APM lifecycle look like in AlignX?

Every app has a lifecycle state (invest, tolerate, migrate, eliminate, retire) with target dates, owner, dependencies and business case. Transitions are governed. Retirement is planned, tracked and evidenced, so you can actually prove the sunset happened.

How do I connect application decisions to the projects that will actually retire them?

A \"Retire this app\" disposition creates or links to the delivery initiative, with owner, budget and target date. The application record shows retirement progress live. You stop discovering \"we still pay for that\" three years after the decision.

See where you stand.

Ten minutes, twenty-one questions, an instant maturity score.

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