One of the more disruptive emerging technologies, robotic process automation (RPA), appears primed for significant growth, despite the fact that many organisations remain confused or concerned about the impact these tools might have on their operations.

The robotic process automation (RPA) market is exploding, RPA has moved up the Gartner hype cycle, and it is no longer a ‘one-day’ technology; it is a technology that is transforming business now.

Early days of robotics process automation implementation

Many organisations are just getting started. They begin with a specific use case, usually by applying proof-of-concept bots in one small area of the business, whether that’s supplier setup, system access provisioning, or invoice reconciliation.

Another trend we are seeing is the use of robotics in the delivery of services, particularly outsourced services. Also, the continual increase in labour rates in major off-shore locations is driving substitution of human labour for automation.

Robotics rate of change

On the software side, there are technologies such as RPA. On the hardware side, we’re talking about drones, driverless cars and even military robots.

Industrial robots have been around for a while, but the boundaries between humans and robots were distinct. Now, the line is blurring as advances in technologies, such as chatbots, come to the fore.

Knowledge Is innovative power

Understanding what disruptive innovation is and how it might potentially affect your industry can be the difference between seeing a disruption coming (letting you get ahead of it) and possibly losing your customer base to a newer and younger competitor.

Recent research indicates that there is a growing demand for RPA, which involves the use of software robots to handle any rules-based repetitive tasks quickly and cost-effectively. And deploying the technology doesn’t have to result in throwing a lot of people out of work.

Beware of stumbling during an RPA rollout

There are no guarantees of success. There have been a number of organisations that stumbled with RPA implementations and this occurred in large enterprises that are highly bureaucratic.

In closing

Disillusionment with RPA is experienced when organisations are not able to reduce as much human capital as they had hoped. Their business cases [and return on investment] was based purely on reducing headcount, which is a narrow way to view the value RPA can provide.

For more information about RPA contact Ryan Danvers on 072 601 2858