When Blackbaud stops keeping up
Reporting lives outside the system
Standard reports answer only the basics. When leadership or funding bodies ask something new, you are back to exports, manual analysis and reformatting before you can respond.
Everyday tasks take longer than they should
Work spreads across separate portals and record imports are manual, so routine administration soaks up time your team would rather spend on grants.
Governance gaps surface at the worst time
Audit requests and funding body reviews expose missing records, inconsistent decisions and process gaps that are hard to fill after the fact.
Contracts and payments happen outside the platform
Funding agreements, variations and payment tracking sit in separate systems or document folders, creating manual reconciliation work and gaps in your audit trail.
OmniStar Grants: Built for accountability and scale
Reporting that answers the questions that matter
Interactive dashboards, temporal analysis and geospatial visualisations give grant managers and leadership a real-time view of portfolio performance, without exporting a spreadsheet.
Structured assessment you can stand behind
Weighted scoring, conflict of interest controls and collaborative review tools embed fairness and consistency into every funding decision.
Governance and audit-readiness built in
OmniStar Grants adapts to your organisation's specific workflows, forms and approval requirements, with ongoing support from dedicated grants management specialists who understand your context.
Integrated contracts and payments
Integrated contracts and payments
Generate templated funding agreements, track variations, monitor compliance and manage payments, all within the platform.
OmniStar Grants vs Blackbaud: capability comparison
See how OmniStar Grants empowers you with advanced capabilities across the complete grant lifecycle.
Category | Feature | OmniStar Grants | Blackbaud |
Capacity and Scalability | Unlimited applications, grant programs, rounds, forms, workflows, reports, dashboards and submissions | Yes | Partial |
Workflow and Automation | Workflow designer | Yes Full designer (over 185+ workflow steps and customisable workflow steps) | No Configurable workflows, no designer |
Conditional logic, task and data automation | Yes | Partial | |
Form Builder (SmartForms) | SmartForm Designer (Form Builder) | Yes | Yes |
Conditional pages and sections | Yes | No | |
Formula fields and autosave | Yes | Partial | |
On-screen signature, input masking (phone number, currency, etc) | Yes | No | |
Excel, Word, PDF and XML output documents | Yes | Partial Word, PDF and Excel only | |
Grants Opportunity | Program budgeting and forecasting, single and multi-stage rounds, round documents, configurable rounds and stages | Yes | Partial Forecasting limited |
Portfolio and program definition | Yes | Yes | |
Round notifications and reminders | Yes | Yes | |
Reviews and Assessment | Non-disclosure agreements, review assignment and individual reviews | Yes | Yes Review assignment |
Conflict of interest | Yes | No | |
Weighted scoring and collaborative reviews | Yes | Yes | |
Bulk reviews | Yes | Partial | |
Application, document, milestone and form reviews | Yes | Yes | |
Meetings and Panels | Meeting attendees and RSVP, meeting pack PDF generation | Yes | No |
Online meeting collaboration and access | Yes | No | |
Meeting agenda and minutes generation | Yes | No | |
Outcome and decision recording | Yes | Yes | |
Decision and Approval | Digital multi-stage, bulk approvals, assign decision, linked and quorum approvals | Yes | Partial Multi-stage, no quorum |
Contracting and Variations | Templated and tokenised funding agreements, schedules, sharing and notification, status tracking, agreement compliance | Yes | Partial Mail-merge templates |
Finance and Payments | Financial system (FMIS) integration | Yes | Partial Financial Edge NXT via custom build |
Export approved payments and import payment confirmation | Yes | Partial | |
PO tracking, partial payments | Yes | Partial Partial payments only | |
Monitoring and Reporting | Dashboards and report designer | Yes Interactive dashboards | Yes 250+ reports |
Temporal data | Yes | Yes | |
Geospatial visualisations | Yes | No | |
Pre-built reports | Yes | Yes | |
Compliance and Security | ISO 27001 certification | Yes | No Data centres only |
IRAP compliance | Yes | No | |
SSO and data encryption | Yes | Yes | |
MFA and audit logs | Yes | Yes | |
Annual independent vulnerability and penetration testing | Yes | Yes | |
Record-based security | Yes | Yes | |
WCAG compliant | Yes | No | |
Disaster recovery | Yes | Yes | |
APIs and Integrations | Integration API and API documentation | Yes | Yes SKY API |
DocuSign and GrantConnect integration | Yes | No | |
Zapier, Webhook and Google Analytics integrations | Yes | Partial Webhooks only | |
Global Functions | Configurable homepage and tiles, favourites and recent | Yes | Yes |
Multi-language support | Yes | Yes AI translation | |
Mobile access | Yes | Yes | |
Bulk document download | Yes | Partial | |
In-system document preview | Yes | Partial | |
Data import (data migration) and data export | Yes | Partial No bulk import | |
Support | 12/5 support and 24/7 support | Yes Optional for 24/7 support | Partial Business hours |
Dedicated account manager | Yes | Partial | |
Interactive Q&A sessions, live webinars, in person training | Yes | Yes | |
Online wiki and video tutorials | Yes | Yes | |
Learning hub, knowledge base, page and field level help | Yes | Yes | |
Web, phone and email support | Yes | Yes |
This comparison is based on publicly available information at the time of writing. Capabilities change over time, and where a feature could not be confirmed from public sources it is shown as 'No'. We recommend confirming current capabilities with the vendor.
Trusted by industry leading organisations
National Breast Cancer Foundation
The National Breast Cancer Foundation (NBCF) was able to streamline its three separate grants management systems into one user-friendly solution using OmniStar.
Testimonials
The level of ongoing customisation and support gives us peace of mind in our investment. We now have a one-stop solution: streamlined processes, great user experience and transparency.
Cindy Liew
Senior Executive
Sunway University
OmniStar had the ability to combine our three systems into one to make everything easier from an administration perspective but also from an applicant and reviewer perspective.
Samantha Oakes
Director, Research Investment
National Breast Cancer Foundation
We couldn't persist in a paper environment. We were looking for a solution that could cover the pre-award and post-award requirements, and we wanted a system that could do ethics as well.
Laila Simpson
Director of Research Operations
The University of Western Australia
It's very accessible to users and administrators with clear processes to follow. It's also flexible allowing you to build your own forms, which are straightforward, and for which you don't need to understand code.
Anna
Research Development Senior Coordinator
Cancer Council WA
The ability to customise the OOTB functionality of the system to align to our specific grant program processes and framework. Pre-award functionality provides for easy and efficient application submission.
Amanda
Senior Project Officer
Department of Resources
It has made our work so much more effective and efficient, especially as we adapt to a hybrid working model, post-Covid.
Michael
CEO
Soil CRC
Easy integration. Great user experience for grant applicants and for the grant management team. Fantastic support from the OmniStar team - very responsive and end to end complete solution.
Adam
Head of Foundation
Plenty of features to use to manage grants and grant processes.
John
Manager
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Frequently asked questions
OmniStar Grants delivers end-to-end solution for grants management - streamlining workflows and ensuring transparency and accountability across the entire lifecycle.
Common indicators include staff maintaining spreadsheets alongside the system, manual processes for contracts or payments, difficulty meeting reporting requirements, or limitations preventing process improvements you want to implement.
OmniStar Grants uses subscription-based pricing calculated per internal user. Pricing is tailored to the number of users. Contact us for a detailed quote based on your organisation's needs.
OmniStar's implementation team manages data migration directly, ensuring your existing data, workflows, and configurations transfer securely with validation at each stage.
Discovery workshops map your workflows and data structures. Historical data transfers with validation. Workflows are reconfigured into OmniStar's automation capabilities. Timeline depends on complexity but typically ranges 4 to 16 weeks.
OmniStar connects with financial systems, CRM platforms, HRIS software, and other applications through a robust API and a large number of out-of-the-box integrations. Contact us to discuss your specific requirements.
OmniStar provides 12/5 support via phone, email, and web, with optional 24/7 coverage. Every customer has a dedicated account manager, and our support team has deep grants management knowledge — not just platform knowledge. We also provide an online knowledge base, video tutorials, live webinars, interactive Q&A sessions, and in-person training options.