There has been growing interest in Robotic Process Automation (RPA) by businesses globally. Many enterprises are turning to this agile automation technology to achieve internal efficiencies, streamline workflows, and reduce costs. According to a survey conducted by Deloitte, 53% of businesses have already integrated RPA as part of their digital transformation journey.

With RPA gaining immense traction in today’s business landscape, it’s essential to clarify confusion and apprehensions surrounding how RPA works and its true business value.

Here are some of the most frequently asked questions about RPA and their answers:

What is Robotic Process Automation (RPA)?

RPA is a useful technology for maximizing the efficient use of a company’s available resources.

It encompasses both the software and services complementing a company’s workforce to boost productivity and achieve the best business results.

Following predefined instructions, RPA technology optimizes software robots (bots) to emulate human actions to perform high-volume, non-intellectual and repetitive tasks. RPA automates manual work promptly, efficiently and more accurately, enabling the human workforce to focus on more value-adding activities.

What is the market size of RPA?

With an astounding value of $1.40 billion in 2019, RPA’s global market is expected to reach $11 billion by 2027, expanding at a compound annual growth rate of 34% from 2020 to 2027.

Worldwide revenue from RPA software is also predicted to reach $1.89 billion with a growth rate of 19.53%.

What processes are eligible for automation?

With the help of bots, a lot of the organizational tasks are accomplished quicker. RPA enables employees to focus on what they do best, helping them generate more profits for the business.

Here are some of the many processes that are eligible for automation:

• Manual and repetitive: Processes involving a high degree of manual input or intervention, including repetitive and structured activities susceptible to human-induced error.
• Low exception rate: Activities containing a low rate of variable outcomes that otherwise requires complex human intervention.
• Rule-based: Activities entailing clear processing instructions ie. template-driven with decision-making based on predictive and standardized rules.
• High volume/high frequency: High volume batch processes run at the end of the day or  end of the month. High-frequency processes that run daily, intra-daily, and weekly.
• Readable inputs: Processes that require readable input formats, including user interface (UI) activities, text-based data, (mouse clicks, keyboard strokes, etc), green screen, and Optical Character Recognition (OCR). These processes operate within almost any environment or application such as web, desktop, Citrix, server, etc.
• Measurable savings: Processes evaluated against a known time/cost base. The benefits or cost savings gained typically can be expressed in terms of reduced staffing costs, greater accuracy, faster response times, and higher productivity from reallocated staff.
• Mature and stable: Processes that are predictable, stable, and well-documented within the business with consistent and well-defined operational costs.

To get the most out of RPA, it is best to avoid automating processes that are either marked for re-work or those that continually change over the short-medium term.

What are the benefits of automation?

By elevating employees’ capacity and productivity to work on value-added and important business matters, RPA equips organizations with commendable business outcomes such as:

• Reduced operational costs
• Shift from process focus to customer focus
• Improved accuracy and quality
• Process speed and timeliness
• Headcount flexibility
• Rapid scalability to demand spikes
• Workforce shifts to higher-value tasks
• Improved risk, compliance and audit management
• Regulatory reporting improvements
• Competitive advantage
• Minimal technology integration costs
• Revenue leakage detection and reduction

Which industries use RPA?

Thanks to RPA, many businesses from the following wide range of industries are now more flexible, agile, and responsive in their day-to-day operations:

• Banking
• Financial services
• Medical and Healthcare
• Agrochem
• Legal
• Recruitment
• Logistics and Distribution
• Mining
• Retail
• Hospitality
• Media
• Ports and Aviation
• Utilities

Where do businesses start with automation?

Leveraging RPA enables enterprises to benefit from greater efficiencies, higher productivity levels, cost reductions, improved customer satisfaction and other competitive advantages enabling them to take their business to the next level.

Nevertheless, its implementation can come with challenges. Thus, before optimizing RPA, it is essential to take the following things into consideration:

• Have you identified the initial processes to start RPA?

• Do you have the budget or are you building a business case for the next FY?
• In which areas or departments do you want to start RPA?
• What RPA drivers (cost reduction, service/quality improvement, reallocation of headcount, reduction of revenue leakage, competitiveness, etc.) that matter to your business?
• What is your process frequency (hourly, daily, semi-weekly, weekly, monthly, etc.)?
• Who will lead the RPA program? Do you have sufficient resources (personnel, IT, HR, etc.) to start with?
• What are your timeframes (PoC/Pilot, Initial Production, Full Enterprise Production)?
• How about your RPA Model (Centre of Excellence, Managed, Hybrid, etc.)?

 

Read 6 Signs that your Business is Ready for RPA for more information.

Are you ready to embrace RPA in your business?

At Neebal, we offer a comprehensive range of RPA services such as:

• License-free: Reduce costs on annual bot license renewals.
• Need-based bots: Develop automated workflows based on your specific needs.
• Deploy anywhere: Deploy RPA bots in and outside your organization.
• Scalable: Automate countless workflows with unlimited bots.

We partner with organizations similar to yours to help you actualise the benefits of workflow automation, achieve rapid ROI and cultivate a flexible operational environment for your future growth.

Here are some applicable scenarios that are ideal for RPA:

• When you have high-volume, low-frequency tasks such as annual, quarterly or ad hoc batch processing.
• When you have limited resources that are being hindered by back-office processing requirements.
• When your team is falling behind on time-sensitive or SLA-related operations.
• When there’s an unexpected spike in data entry or data conversion.
• When you are looking to extend capability without increasing headcount.

 

Here are some benefits that await if you use RPA services:

1. Significantly cheaper when compared to an FTE.
2. No software investment required.
3. Instant notification of task completion or unexpected scenarios.
4. Tasks can be executed 24 x 7 x 365.
5. No RPA knowledge or learning required.
6. No interference with your day-to-day operations.
7. Win back time to focus on growing your business.
8. No technology infrastructure to build and maintain.

Harness the true power of automation with Neebal

We at Neebal work to deliver improved automated solutions for businesses across Pharma, Agro, BFSI and FMCG industries. With more than a decade’s presence our services are transforming process efficiencies to provide purpose driven and outcome oriented solutions. We provide customized on-demand technology services to ensure satisfaction and loyalty among the users.

Our tailor made offerings enable companies to serve organizations’ diverse requirements and ensure comprehensive growth. Schedule a call with our experts to discuss your automation requirements and kick-start your digital transformation!