Automation Anywhere Reviews

We use Automation Anywhere for web scraping, PDF automation, Excel automation, and API automation.

The most valuable features of Automation Anywhere are Excel, periods, database, and email action.

Automation Anywhere should improve its OCR capabilities.

I would like to see more communication between other technologies. We can directly implement some coding scripts. We already have Python, JavaScript, and VBA, but having some programming languages like Java and dot Net would be great.

I have been using Automation Anywhere for five years.

Automation Anywhere is a stable solution.

Automation Anywhere is a scalable solution.

Our company has different teams, and more than 500 users are using Automation Anywhere in our organization. More than 20 administrators use the solution.

The solution's technical support team gives you different solutions. Some solutions work, but others seem irrelevant. It would help our organization if they gave accurate solutions instead of tentative solutions. They have to improve the speed of their response time.

The solution's initial setup is easy and not very complex.

We develop the bot, test it on our local environment, and then take it to UAT and production. For simple usage, the solution's deployment may take around 30 days. We implement the solution through an in-house team.

We need only one resource for the solution's deployment. When everything looks good after the testing and peer review, we deploy the bot into production.

Automation Anywhere is easy to learn. I'm also looking at UiPath, but I'm not finding time to explore that RPA tool. Automation Anywhere is a hybrid tool, which we can see in the code view as well as in the flow chart view. On the other hand, UiPath has only flowchart diagrams. UiPath is ruling the RPA industry, but Automation Anywhere is next to UiPath. It would be great if Automation Anywhere had all the capabilities that are present in UiPath.

People who don't have technical experience can learn to use Automation Anywhere quickly because it's easily understandable. They can easily build bots by going through the documentation and videos in Automation Anywhere University. Normally, business users will run the bots and know the functionality, but if they want to learn Automation Anywhere, they can easily learn it in a couple of days.

Currently, we have more than 10 bots in production and more than 20 bots under testing.

If anyone wants to use Automation Anywhere, I won't say it is a 100% perfect automation tool because it depends on the developer and logic. Users may sometimes face hiccups in running end-to-end automation. There are chances of the bot getting hampered while working on some websites.

Automation Anywhere fails to load some objects for some old technologies or websites. It would be helpful if the solution could read every technology and clone every object on the website, even for legacy technologies.

Overall, I rate Automation Anywhere an eight out of ten.

We use it for doing automation inside of Citrix. It's for image-based automation.

It's very easy for business users to learn Automation Anywhere. You do not need to have technical skills in order to leverage the product. It is pretty easy to learn how to use it.

The learning curve in terms of making automations is low. It's a low-code platform. People are finding it very easy to learn how to do things. 

It might take six to eight weeks in order to train non-technical employees to use Automation Anywhere. 

It has been good for our financial management reporting. 

Using RPA bots and APIs is easy. It's easy to integrate.

Automation Anywhere has helped us increase automation consumption. We do a lot of financial reporting, even on SAP. We've done a lot of automations around ERP and our SAP database.

Automation Anywhere was difficult with certain applications with respect to Java platforms. For these, we'd likely use UiPath instead. Handling Java-based applications or browser-based applications could be better. 

Automation Anywhere should have more Excel-related functionality. 

I've used the solution for four or five years. 

The product is not at all stable. They should improve the stability.

The solution scales enough. We haven't faced any scaling problems. 

The product has a very good support team. We have not had any major challenges with them.

Positive

We also use UiPath.

We migrated to a gateway situation. It was challenging as the architecture was different. We faced a lot of issues and it took time to migrate. There were a few functionalities that were not working and we needed to recreate the workflows. When we started, most of the ports were not working. The migration did not go as expected. Then, there was a new version of my initial VPN. It took more than a year to migrate.

The solution does require some maintenance. You do need to maintain the bots. 

We have witnessed an ROI while using Automation Anywhere. 

The pricing is still high. For every new feature, there is an additional charge.

I'm an Automation Anywhere customer.

We have not yet started using Co-Pilot.

I would rate the solution eight out of ten. It's good for automating processes. 

We use Automation Anywhere to automate our processes. The company has three bot creators and one bot runner, but there are other users triggering the bots in various ways. I don't have a precise number of end-users, but it's around 20 people. 

The solution's primary benefit is improved efficiency. Automation Anywhere enabled us to enhance many processes that were previously done manually. It helps save time while improving compliance by keeping the data clean. We've also increased visibility for our end-users because we use the data from Automation Anywhere to build dashboards. 

Each process might take one or two hours manually, but we can complete the same processes in a few minutes. It frees our employees to focus on other things, such as training and building new skills. It took about three weeks to fully realize the benefits because we had to adjust the processes. 

The API integration has been helpful. There are no errors, and it performs much faster than any object clone or anything like that. My overall experience with API integration is positive. I use Power Automate for documents and OCR, but I haven't used Automation Anywhere for this purpose. It saves time if we use the APIs more than just the RPA bots, and it reduces the number of errors. Overall, our automation consumption has increased by about 70 percent. 

I've had a generally positive experience with Automation Anywhere. The solution has improved significantly in the latest version. They've added some handy Excel actions that have saved me a lot of time as a developer. Object cloning has been enhanced, so our automated processes are more stable and have fewer errors. 

Automation Anywhere is accessible to users without technical knowledge. However, you need to learn some basic programming skills to go from conceptualizing a business use case to realizing an automated process. Breaking down a process step by step requires some rudimentary programming and problem-solving skills. Most of it is drag-and-drop, but you need to understand programming logic. 

I had some programming skills before I started, so it wasn't difficult for me to learn. It took me about two weeks to get comfortable using the software. There are lots of resources online, so I could easily Google information whenever I got stuck on something.

I haven't tried training any non-technical users. When I started at this company, we all underwent the same training. The employees' skills and backgrounds varied. I have more of a technical background, and another colleague had taken some programming courses previously. Others had backgrounds in finance, operations, marketing, etc. All of those people took seven days of training, but they aren't doing anything with Automation Anywhere. They're business users, not developers. Non-technical people need at least a couple of weeks to learn the solution. 

We've struggled with some of the new features Automation Anywhere added in the latest version. For example, they added a new OpenAI package, but it took a while for me to find it in the actions menu.

It would be helpful if the company communicated more about new features or created some built-in instructions within the platform. I feel like we aren't fully utilizing the latest features. They could add some links to tutorials or provide some training to walk us through the new features.

I've been using Automation Anywhere for three years.

The stability has improved significantly in the latest version. 

I rate Automation Anywhere eight out of 10 for scalability. The scalability is excellent because we have subtasks and bots that we can reuse to scale up other customers. We can build templates and customize them for various clients' needs. We can also combine sub-tasks and templates to build bigger bots. 

I rate Automation Anywhere seven out of 10 for support. We had a customer service rep who was supposed to help us with issues when they arise, but we had a bad experience, so we started going through the ticketing system, which has worked out well. 

Neutral

I was using the online version of Power Automate to try it out for a week or two. 

I rate Automation Anywhere eight out of 10. I recommend getting some training before using Automation Anywhere. Try to automate as many processes as you can to understand appropriate use cases. You must learn to translate a business requirement into a bot's coding. Learn as much as you can about all the features. It's sometimes hard to keep up with the latest updates. 

My biggest lesson has been the importance of persistence. You have to keep trying to improve the processes because there are often better ways to do something and multiple approaches you can adopt. You need to occasionally revisit processes you've already automated and consider ways to improve them. Initially, I would automate a process and move on, but you sometimes need to optimize the process first. 

I am using Automation Anywhere to automate tasks with desktop applications. There are SAP applications, ERP applications, and browser-based applications. The business is related to the airline.

Automation Anywhere helps a lot. It saves time. Recently, we automated a process that used to take 5 minutes for an application, and there were 500 applications. It used to take a lot of time. Now, it takes only 1 minute for an application. The time savings vary based on the process. For some processes, it saves 70% of the time, and for others, it saves up to 50% of the time.

It frees up people from manual and repetitive tasks. They can do other interesting tasks.

Automation Anywhere is very stable. At run time, Automation Anywhere can let you know which line of code the bot is running and what it is doing. It is very clear. It is also easy to debug. When you have some change requests or you have to update the new version of the code to fix something, Automation Anywhere can help you to do the code review. Similar to GitHub, you can see the difference between the two versions. It is very good for that purpose.

When working with Excel, unlike other tools such as UiPath, Automation Anywhere does not have the standard variables for .Net data types. It does not support data tables and many of the data types supported by Microsoft and the .Net technology. When designing automation, you need to use only the few data types that Automation Anywhere supports. For example, when you work with Excel, you need to do many tasks with the data tables, cells, and rows, but that is more difficult with Automation Anywhere than with other platforms.

It is not flexible for custom activities. With UiPath, you can use C#. You can use VB.NET directly. With Automation Anywhere, customization is more complicated than UiPath.

There are a lot of resources available on the Internet to learn Automation Anywhere. They have Automation Anywhere University, but the difficult thing is that it does not have a specific path for a beginner. When I was learning it initially, I had to choose randomly. I could not work out where to start. It is probably better now.

A good thing about Automation Anywhere is that when the bot is running, it displays which line of the code is running, but we also want those logs to be displayed on the web. When we implement an automation process, currently, we have to write the code to archive the logs. That is the thing they need to improve.

I have been using Automation Anywhere for almost 3 years. I am using Automation 360. It is web-based. 

It is stable.

I have worked with UiPath, Power Automate, and a few local automation tools available in our country.

UiPath is easier to use for business users than Automation Anywhere. Automation Anywhere is also not as good as UiPath for custom activities. It takes a month to train a non-technical user on Automation Anywhere. You also cannot directly use C# and VB.NET. If it starts to support all data types in the platform, that would make it easier to learn and use.

We have used Google or Microsoft OCR for document understanding. We have also used the API of a third party to translate the document and email it.

At this time, I prefer open-source solutions because of the cost.

It is deployed on-premises, and its deployment is straightforward.

The deployment of a bot used to take about three days. There were some steps for approval, and we used to manually deploy, but now, my company has CI/CD integration. We run the pipeline to automatically deploy. It is very fast now. It just takes an hour. We just need some approvals and we need to review the package. It is straightforward. One person is enough for deployment.

It is also easy to upgrade Automation Anywhere. It is not difficult. In terms of maintenance, one or two people are enough to maintain the bots. If there is any issue with the bot, we can resolve that within 5 days.

It is not too expensive, but there are many tools available in the market that can provide the same functionality at a cheaper price.

I have done some research on the automation market, and I see that there are many automation platforms. There are also open-source ones. Every organization wants to reduce the costs. Organizations are now considering cheaper platforms such as Microsoft Power Automate. Even my current organization is considering migrating to an open-source solution.

I tried the AI capability, but it did not help me much in reality. I did not find it stable. It will probably get stable in the future. 

We are using APIs for integration. It is a perfect way to integrate.

I would rate Automation Anywhere a 9 out of 10. 

We use Automation Anywhere to process data entry from our government website.

We implemented Automation Anywhere to reduce human effort and cut costs.

Automation Anywhere offers a complete solution, encompassing both development tools and a control room for managing automation.

Automation Anywhere's front end is designed to be user-friendly for non-technical individuals, while the back end remains under the management of IT.

Several of our projects incorporate generative AI, and while we are new to this field, it has proven beneficial thus far.

The integration of APIs in Automation Anywhere is easy and works well.

We integrated Automation Anywhere with some of the business applications which was straightforward.

Automation Anywhere has helped save time.

The license cost is high and needs improvement.

I have been using Automation Anywhere for over two years.

Automation Anywhere is stable.

Automation Anywhere is scalable.

The technical support is good. The few times I called them they were able to promptly address my issues.

Positive

We switched from Automation Anywhere to Power Automate because of the price and more functionality with other Microsoft products.

We were not able to migrate from Automation Anywhere to Power Automate. We had to recreate everything from scratch.

I prefer Automation Anywhere to Power Automate because it offers a more comprehensive set of features, performs reliably, and provides deeper insights.

The licensing cost for Automation Anywhere is high.

I rate Automation Anywhere nine out of ten.

While Automation Anywhere offers training and community versions for learning and experimentation, it is not user-friendly for non-technical users.

No maintenance is required.

I primarily used Automation Anywhere to streamline and automate standardized business processes. This included tasks such as claims handling, policy registration, and document processing from customers. Our focus was on creating efficient and consistent workflows for handling routine documentation flows.

We aimed to solve the challenges of a hands-off, lights-out approach by implementing Automation Anywhere. The goal was to automate processes like claims handling and document registration, minimizing manual intervention and ensuring a more efficient workflow.

Anywhere contributed to increased efficiency, reduced manual efforts, and notable time savings across various processes.

There is room for improvement in terms of costs and procurement considerations. Additionally, aspects like procurement conditions, technical connectivity, and global reach with Automation Anywhere could be enhanced as well. As part of procurement, these factors become crucial, especially in a global operating context where using the platform in various countries is a key consideration.

We started using Automation Anywhere in 2018.

I wasn't entirely satisfied with Automation Anywhere's support. Cultural differences between them and UiPath or DDI were noticeable, and understanding their company perspective was crucial. Despite this, I handled it professionally, and it was generally okay with no major issues. I would rate the support as an eight out of ten.

Positive

Before using Automation Anywhere, we initially explored three different automation solutions. One was widely mandated across the company and had better pricing. The second was used regionally, but the local teams struggled to adapt to robotics process automation. 

When comparing Automation Anywhere specifically, the solutions were acceptable and useful, but pricing conditions and procurement leverage were areas that could be improved. Overall, the transition to Automation Anywhere enhanced our processes. The choice depended on factors like regulations and conditions. Automation Anywhere didn't have the ease of a global solution we experienced with another tool. We also used DDI locally, which was good in quality but needed transformation into a full RPA solution. Comparing Automation Anywhere with UiPath, UiPath was more global, scalable, and had better contract and pricing conditions.

Automation Anywhere requires limited maintenance, and at the time, three individuals were involved in maintenance and implementation. As the applications expanded, there was a need for a gradual increase in the team for ongoing support and enhancements.

Introducing Automation Anywhere to non-tech-savvy business users had its challenges. Some needed training to understand and develop their use cases with technical support, while others already grasped the requirements and could effectively communicate with developers. Managing this diverse group required a centralized approach. Training typically took one to three months, depending on individual skill sets, to bring non-technical employees up to speed on using Automation Anywhere.

We currently use standard RPA with Automation Anywhere, not incorporating Automation Co-Pilot. The challenge is identifying repetitive tasks suitable for RPA. We are exploring whether these functionalities are embedded in existing software or if direct engagement with RPA providers is necessary. The ongoing discussion revolves around the potential future integration of robotic solutions into software. For artificial intelligence, we distinguish between IoT, machine learning, and similar aspects, with development ongoing from both smaller players and major companies like Microsoft. The goal is to combine both robotic and AI solutions for comprehensive automation eventually.

Integration with other tools and applications with Automation Anywhere was smooth, especially for cloud-based applications. We did not encounter any significant difficulties, and the process was straightforward, meeting relevant requirements.

Automation Anywhere provided us with good automation at scale, and we did not encounter any problems with its ability to handle large-scale automation tasks.

Overall, I would rate Automation Anywhere as an eight out of ten.

We use Automation Anywhere to automate all back-office manual tasks, including service case management, support cases, and financial reconciliations between multiple spreadsheets and source systems.

We faced challenges because we were running the on-premises version. It was too demanding on our physical system architecture. Last year, we moved to the cloud, which has improved our landscape. It's better now, but it was tough before. Anyone new to Automation Anywhere will find it much better now.

Before we implemented Automation Anywhere, all of our tasks were manual. Automating them has saved us a lot of time and eliminated a lot of risk. As of now, our run rate is around 15,000 manual hours saved per year.

Automation Anywhere helps eliminate our daily manual tasks, allowing our staff to focus on more valuable tasks.

We have integrated AA with Salesforce, our homegrown platform, ServiceNow, and PeopleSoft.

Our workflows, APIs, business applications, and document automation integration with AA are well-integrated and efficient.

AA has helped us save time.

The code automation platform is the most valuable feature.

Recently, Automation Anywhere acquired FortressIQ, a company that specializes in discovery automation. Discovery automation is the process of sitting down with businesses and documenting their processes and all related information. It is a very human-intensive process. Automation Anywhere acquired FortressIQ to do this work, but the two platforms are not yet seamlessly integrated. This is a pain point that we are currently working on.

I hope that Automation Anywhere can improve its capabilities in the areas of sophisticated unstructured data parsing, contextual routing, and long-running process orchestration. These are areas where AI can be especially helpful. For example, AA could use AI to suggest the next best action in a process and to configure everything in one shot. It should also be smart enough to adjust and move on.

The process discovery side needs improvement. Before we can automate, we must document the current process map and create a process design document. This is a time-consuming and painful process. We have to go to the line-of-business people who perform the operations, sometimes multiple times, to get an understanding of the problem. Automation Anywhere is improving in this area, but it's still not perfect. So, we're relying more on other reliable platforms. The platforms they acquired are not yet fully integrated into the core RPA design platform. This is a big gap. If they can close the gap between discovery and bot development, it would eliminate many manual hours of discovery, allowing the automation team, or COA team, to scale faster.

I have been using Automation Anywhere for four and a half years.

At first, we had issues with the stability, but it has significantly improved in the last six months after we migrated to the 360 version.

Automation Anywhere can scale vertically, but not horizontally. This means that it can add more resources to a single machine to handle increased load, but it cannot distribute the workload across multiple machines. This is a limitation for long-running, complex processes that require state maintenance. However, Automation Anywhere has a roadmap item to release a horizontal scaling solution in 2024.

In other words, Automation Anywhere can scale up, but not out. We can add as many small bots as we want to a single machine, but we cannot distribute the workload across multiple machines.

Technical support is decent. We were previously on a lower level of service support but realized we needed better support and were upgraded to top-level service. It's been better since then. We have a dedicated account customer success manager and architect assigned to us, so we can ping them anytime and they'll chase it for us internally.

Positive

The initial deployment was straightforward. It took six months to deploy ten bots.

The pricing of AA is similar to UiPath.

We evaluated UiPath but AA is more resource friendly and has a shorter learning curve.

I would rate Automation Anywhere eight out of ten.

Our organization's approach and strategy will be to accelerate cross-cutting capability across all technology solutions, including automation. We expect vendors like Automation Anywhere to step up their game to compete. If they cannot compete in the United States, they will not be able to compete in the rest of the world and will be left behind.

We tried to get business users to build bots. We have reports of business users who have built bots. It is easy to get them started, but it is very difficult to get them to build production-quality bots. I am sure that this is a common challenge with any tool or platform. All the solution developers and concepts are theoretical. In reality, they do not work. Business users can build whatever they want, but their bots will not withstand the production infrastructure. Therefore, we need to step in and do the job properly. I do not believe in the concept of business users building bots. It just creates more problems down the line.

The learning curve is around two weeks.

We are starting a POC for Co-Pilot which was formally ARI. At the time when it was ARI, it was not a good feature.

Runners in our local landscape require maintenance.

We have automated PO processing, PO-to-order booking, and various website flows, such as ticket generation, timely uploads of files on the website, and report generation. We have also automated report delivery to all end-users.

Manual efforts have been reduced and the accuracy has increased. In the processes I have done, the accuracy has reached 100 percent, and manual load and time has been reduced.

Object cloning and Excel operations are what we use most.

The ability of Automation Anywhere to provide automation at scale, on a scale of one to 10, is a nine. Integration of its RPA bots using APIs is an eight out of 10.

More and more innovation is going on, and they'll have to keep adding features to keep up with the market. They have generative AI on their platform, but that's a new part. They are working on it. It's not 100 percent foolproof, but eventually it will get better. They need to work on their AI capabilities.

I have been using Automation Anywhere for four years.

The new version is stable now. When we first started, the platform was not stable, but it became stable when we shifted to A360.

If we are stuck anywhere, their technical team is always available. We have raised one or two issues with them and they were able to help us out and turn them around.

We haven't required them very much, but they are available if we need them.

Positive

I've worked with Microsoft Power Automate, but at a very basic level.

The initial deployment is easy. The documentation is clear. Implementing A360 on-premises, a complete end-to-end installation, takes four hours. We just need the server team for administrator passwords.

I had already tested and tried it on a development server, so I had all the steps written that I had to follow for deployment to production. It didn't take much time. I read the installation guidelines and documentation from Automation Anywhere and it was easy for me to do it.

We have about 25 end-users of the solution in our organization, and three of us take care of maintenance. In terms of bot maintenance, not much time is spent unless and until there's a change in the process or the environment.

For business users who do not have technical skills, it is easy to use the product. They understand what is possible with the tool over time. Within a year, they understood what needed to be automated and what not. Training non-technical employees on Automation Anywhere usage takes three to six months.

I did it myself.

It's an ongoing process. I have done more than 400 processes for our client over a four-year period. The time a process takes to automate depends on the complexity of the process. Within three or four weeks, a process is generally completely done, from development to production.

We tried UiPath at the time, but Automation Anywhere was more promising. It was easy to scale the bots in Automation Anywhere, and the implementation using Automation Anywhere was simpler compared to UiPath. However, I've heard from people working with UiPath that it's faster compared to Automation Anywhere. The execution time for Automation Anywhere might be 10 seconds, whereas with UiPath it might take six seconds.

If someone is considering an API integration instead of an RPA solution, that means the API has to be available. Using Automation Anywhere, you can automate any process completely, end-to-end. It doesn't need an API. We can automate front-end, Excel, Word—anything. That is more helpful compared to an API integration.

We are a partner of Automation Anywhere, and we utilize their software in the manufacturing industry for procurement and administration purposes.

Most of our customers deploy the solution on the public cloud, with some opting for private cloud deployment, and a small percentage choosing on-premises deployment. The majority of our customers are extremely price-conscious.

We deploy Automation Anywhere for our cost-effective customers. These customers prioritize automation for fee optimization rather than productivity improvement. 

Business users without technical skills can still utilize Automation Anywhere with some training. The solution is user-friendly, however, we provide training for individuals before they come on board. Therefore, there is support available in that regard.

On average it takes two months to train someone without technical skills to use Automation Anywhere.

Automation Anywhere aids our customers in enhancing productivity and optimizing workforce size. Typically, we achieve a 25 to 30 percent reduction in time, although the exact results may vary depending on the specific case.

Although Automation Anywhere may not match Blue Prism's scale of automation due to budget constraints, our current clients can still have their requirements met by Automation Anywhere.

Automation Anywhere's most valuable feature is its seamless integration into procurement software, allowing for the automation of purchase orders, billing, employee travel details, and other tasks.

Integrating RPA bots, APIs, business applications, and documents in Automation Anywhere is a challenging task. We have come across a type of YAML application that we use with the APIs, enabling us to get a holistic picture. However, direct integration has always been problematic. For instance, when attempting to integrate with SAP, we encounter certain gaps. As a solution, we can either input the data into the call sheet or create a YAML application for the integration process. Unfortunately, it is not a seamless process where we can transfer everything directly into an SAP system. This presents a double issue for us. I would like Automation Anywhere to work with SAP and improve their interfaces.

The technical support needs improvement. They take a long time to respond, and they are not very knowledgeable.

I have been using Automation Anywhere for six years.

Automation Anywhere is stable.

Automation Anywhere can scale, but it requires significant intervention from the technical team to achieve.

Technical support is difficult to reach and obtain a resolution.

Neutral

We used to use Blue Prism for our customers, which offered better integration and more features. However, we had to switch to Automation Anywhere due to the high initial license fee associated with Blue Prism. Automation Anywhere is more cost-effective.

The initial setup is straightforward. The complexity lies within the interfaces. Our development team handles the internal implementation for our customers.

We implement the solution for our customers.

Our clients definitely see a return on investment because that's how we gain business.

I would rate Automation Anywhere's cost a six out of ten, with ten being the most expensive.

I would rate Automation Anywhere a six out of ten. When compared to other options, Automation Anywhere remains a more cost-effective solution. However, it has integration issues and is not directly compatible with many ERP systems, which forces us to find numerous workarounds.

In recent years, there have been many cheaper solutions that have become available. To a certain extent, I believe these solutions need to meet the current requirements. We began using Automation Anywhere years ago, but with new clients, there is a bit of a challenge to convince them to adopt the solution due to the availability of other options in the market.

With the variety of solutions available in the market today, people are seeking the most cost-effective option. RPA was a viable choice a few years ago when we began in 2017. However, attitudes have since changed, leading people to consider more affordable tools. Additionally, individuals are reluctant to bear substantial license charges, as we faced with Automation Anywhere, where we had to pay significant fees annually.

Automation Anywhere is more commonly deployed across various departments and less frequently in multiple locations. Due to its typical usage, we are employing it as a standalone model for each functional department.

Automation Anywhere requires maintenance due to changes we handle from the client center, as well as the configuration of the solution according to all client requirements. We need more than five people for the maintenance.

We spend one to two months maintaining bots.

For an organization that has a technical team and wants to deploy a cost-effective solution, I recommend Automation Anywhere.

I am striving to provide individuals with more time to focus on value-add tasks due to widespread headcount reductions. For instance, in finance and accounting activities, we use Automation Anywhere to replace individuals in maintenance tasks or those that were previously unknown to be time-consuming. This is where we witness the greatest utilization of bots. 

Moreover, we employ bots to handle fines associated with individuals driving company cars. With hundreds of fines occurring each month, it used to be a nearly full-time responsibility for one person to receive the fine, identify the driver at the time of the incident, and ensure the fine was directed to the appropriate person for payment. Such activities lacked significant value and consumed a considerable amount of time for someone, but now the bot handles these tasks on our behalf. I believe that finance is the primary area where we extensively utilize Automation Anywhere.

When we began deploying the bots, we established Key Performance Indicators to assess the return on investment. For instance, if a bot could save one-third of an individual's time, we would evaluate the amount of time saved and dedicate it to value-add tasks. However, evaluating the exact monetary savings facilitated by the bots is challenging because the funds are not directly spent on low-value activities. Instead, they can be utilized differently. 

It is important to note that the bots never completely replaced human workers. No job was entirely taken over by a bot. Rather, it was an assessment of how effectively we spent money with the assistance of bots, as they enabled individuals to perform tasks more efficiently. Although I don't recall the exact details since it was in the past, we would reassign the equivalent of full-time employees to these value-added tasks instead of low-value ones. At the time of my departure from the RPA topic, we had 150 bots in production, and we had a clear understanding of how many full-time employees would be dedicated to higher-value tasks as a result.

The ability of Automation Anywhere to provide automation at scale is commendable. We have indeed achieved tangible business benefits. That is certain. I am no longer aware of the metric used to evaluate this, except for the fact that we have eliminated various mundane activities from the workday of numerous individuals.

Automation Anywhere has helped our organization increase its automation consumption.

From what I recall of the type of issue we had to deal with when we started implementing Automation Anywhere, it was the integration with the identity and access management system that the company might use. This is because Automation Anywhere has a vault where we store all the information related to the bot, including the password it will use to connect to the system. The feature, which might be interesting for companies that don't already have an identity management system, was a bit tricky because I would have preferred the system to directly rely on our corporate identity and access management system to manage the bot's credentials. This way, we wouldn't have to store this information in the bot as well. It's something to consider in terms of integrating with an existing IT landscape.

I have been using Automation Anywhere for almost six years.

We did not encounter any stability issues with Automation Anywhere during the time I worked with the solution.

Automation Anywhere is scalable.

The technical support was helpful and responsive.

Positive

We had previously been using UiPath, and in late 2017, we acquired an organization that was already using Automation Anywhere, which belonged to a much larger organization. Consequently, we began to explore that tool and benefited from our colleagues' positive experiences with Automation Anywhere.

They were able to provide suggestions on the setup and deployment of the solution. As a result, we ultimately decided to discontinue the use of UiPath and transitioned to Automation Anywhere. Without the acquisition, we might not have implemented Automation Anywhere and instead would have continued with UiPath or explored other alternatives. Due to the acquisition, we were able to recognize that Automation Anywhere was one of the market leaders and swiftly create a proof of concept.

The initial setup was straightforward. Although I was involved in the deployment project, the actual installation was carried out by those responsible for implementing the Windows servers.

We needed to acquire the hardware because we had an internal cloud at that time, so we still have it. I would say that we managed to allocate the servers. It didn't take long. We provided training for the people who would deploy and customize the product with the assistance of Automation Anywhere in France. The global deployment infrastructure was ready to be used within a few weeks.

The implementation was completed in-house with the help of the Automation Anywhere team.

We obtained benefits from the original price prior to the acquisition and had to engage in negotiations due to the expansion of the usage scope. We were required to purchase licenses and bot runners, which determined the permissible run times for the bots. We successfully achieved a fair price worldwide. 

I rate Automation Anywhere an eight out of ten. 

We primarily utilize an attended bot, meaning they are not created by users. We have made efforts to retain control over IT in bot creation to prevent it from becoming a new avenue for shadow IT. When we started in 2018, the final department had a dedicated team responsible for bot development. However, they eventually hired contractors who developed C-Sharp programs that interacted with SAP through APIs. The bot would simply launch these programs, which is not the ideal method for automation, as we believe the bot should directly interact with the application instead of relying on a separate program to communicate with SAP through an API. I believe the team responsible for this no longer exists. Presently, we have a process in place to identify relevant use cases, and we are collaborating with a subcontractor who creates the bots for us based on specifications provided by the business.

We utilize Automation Anywhere with an attended bot. This implies that after receiving the specifications from the business and creating the purchase, we establish an agreement on the bot's scheduling for execution. However, the user never directly interacts with the bot; they only observe the results of its actions. Therefore, there is no need to provide training for users to utilize Automation Anywhere. We maintain IT control over it, while the development itself is outsourced. Consequently, the issue of the learning curve is not applicable to our situation.

We didn't use a lot of APIs with Automation Anywhere. Instead, we simulated the user's actions on the application's user interface. I can't recall any instances where we relied on APIs to initiate actions in the systems we were connecting to. However, I am aware that APIs can be utilized. There was a point when we wanted to employ APIs to retrieve the password or the bot from our identity and access the financial system just before the bot was about to commence its task. Additionally, we intended to trigger an API to reset the password once the bot had completed its job to ensure that there were no potential security threats associated with the user IDs used for the bots.

For those who prefer using API integration instead of a comprehensive process automation solution, I would like to emphasize that it's not exactly the same approach. Integrated APIs require developing a program for them to interact with. In my opinion, RPA offers a more straightforward approach as it simply replicates user actions within an application. We already have a ready-to-use bot. However, I wouldn't recommend using bots for everything, especially when we encounter use cases that resemble interfaces. 

Essentially, it involves manipulating the user interface of an application to extract data and then sending that data to another application on a daily basis. This approach doesn't seem logical. I'm not sure about the usage of APIs in the context of actual IT program development, where we need to retrieve data from various source systems that provide APIs. In such cases, we genuinely desire bots that faithfully mimic the actions of real users within an application. Our intention was never to replace any kind of deployment with bots, which is why we wanted Information and Communication Technology to be involved in the decision-making process. We wanted to ensure that the distinction was made between tasks that should be handled by bots and those that should be treated as interfaces or programs, aligning with our understanding of process automation.

We have a team of three people in Spain who are in charge of the daily operation of the Automation Anywhere platform. However, deploying our new bot is a quick process. There is a test environment where the bot is validated, after which it is transferred to the production control room and the bot's schedule is updated.

The team responsible for the data operations of the platform, taking everything into account, including the intrusion of the new bot into the production environment. They also handle the platform's maintenance. I believe we have three individuals dedicated to these tasks.