Since the outset of the pandemic, organizations have been increasingly launching initiatives aimed at automating business processes, turning to technologies such as robotic process automation (RPA) in efforts to reduce costs, speed up tasks, and improve accuracy of core business operations. Some leading organizations, however, are not stopping there. Seeking to push their automation agendas forward, they are embracing a move toward broader "intelligent automation" (IA), a strategy that weaves capabilities such as artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning (ML) into standard RPA to enhance its functionality. In addition to RPA, AI, and ML, intelligent automation strategies can also incorporate a mix of technologies such as natural language processing, chatbots, and others that complement each other, says Lakshmanan Chidambaram, president of Americas strategic verticals at global IT consulting firm Tech Mahindra. "These technologies together allow us to automate business processes to a larger extent, when compared to simple RPA automations," Chidambaram says.

Many organizations aspire to automation levels that rival the likes of Amazon, where processes flow seamlessly between people, systems, and devices. A recent Gartner report found businesses are evolving their use of artificial intelligence (AI) as part of their automation strategies, with one third of organizations surveyed applying AI across several business units. If they're honest with themselves, these organizations want automation to achieve some sort of goal -- whether that's improving the customer experience, increasing cost efficiencies, or making life easier for employees. Automation can and should be applied to each of these goals, but it should be done in a fully orchestrated way across the entire organization. Jakob Freund, co-founder and CEO of Camunda, an open-source workflow and decision automation platform, says today, many organizations automate locally -- or within a single team, system, or device.

It's been roughly five years since RPA was anointed to be the next best thing to a slice of IT bread. RPA was, to some extent, an IT dream -- non-invasive as it sat unobtrusively outside our enterprise mission control systems ERPs, HRMS and mainframes, quietly automating our legacy processes, asking for nothing more than access to our systems of record. Expecting customers to automate all their processes within their company, early RPA vendors offered a full suite of bells and whistles. Now in the wake of the pandemic, clearly the market has expressed a bite-sized appetite for change instead of the whole buffet. This is where RPA as a service (RPAaaS) comes to the forefront.

Robotic Process Automation (RPA) in 2022 won't be about what's new and shiny, but rather the evolution and maturation of trends already underway. This should be welcome news for IT and business leaders who see RPA as a single tine in a multi-prong automation strategy. "New and shiny" does not necessarily produce results. But 2022 in general is likely to be a year where boards, investors, customers, and other stakeholders ask: Where are the results? To put it more specifically: Where are the results from those outsized investments you've been making in digital transformation, AI/ML, cloud, and elsewhere?

How does an automation company automate itself? We hear this question often. If we encourage you to become a fully automated enterprise it's reasonable that we are one as well. Yesterday, we reported our first quarter as a public company. Starting today, every quarter following our earnings, we will announce the latest stats from our own enterprise-wide automation program led by our automation Center of Excellence (CoE).

It's been roughly five years since RPA was anointed to be the next best thing to a slice of IT bread. RPA was, to some extent, an IT dream -- non-invasive as it sat unobtrusively outside our enterprise mission control systems ERPs, HRMS and mainframes, quietly automating our legacy processes, asking for nothing more than access to our systems of record. Expecting customers to automate all their processes within their company, early RPA vendors offered a full suite of bells and whistles. Now in the wake of the pandemic, clearly the market has expressed a bite-sized appetite for change instead of the whole buffet. This is where RPA as a service (RPAaaS) comes to the forefront.

Automation is one of the most exciting innovations in the field of marketing and advertising. An automated message can save a business both time and money. With the latent ability that most artificial intelligence chatbots have today, an automated message need not be straightforward and simple. The goal of any statement should be to engage the customer, and modern AI makes it easy for businesses to craft a message along these lines. But what are the elements of an engaging automated message?

Nearly two-thirds of US IT decision-makers plan to increase their investments in automation technology over the next year as a result of Covid-19, noting that intelligent self-service has been key to remaining agile during the crisis. These are some of the findings from a new survey conducted by market research firm Opinion Matters and commissioned by Intelligent Virtual Agent (IVA) platform provider Inference Solutions. The study, Intelligent Automation Post-Covid-19, explores how IT leaders in mid-sized businesses and enterprises across eight industries are evolving their digital strategies in the wake of the pandemic, and how they have used automation to tackle challenges driven by shutdowns and social distancing. Significantly, 71% of IT decision makers agree that intelligent self-service automation has helped their organizations remain agile, and 64% expect to increase automation investments over the coming year as a result of the crisis. More than a quarter (26%) of organizations will increase their investments by 10% or higher.

More enterprises are implementing robotics process automation (RPA) to increase operational efficiencies. However, some implementations have faltered because the lines of business weren't able to contemplate all of the technical and governance issues or IT built a solution that doesn't really align with business needs. Who should own RPA shouldn't be an either/or proposition. Business and IT leaders, as well as process owners, should work together within the context of an enterprise automation strategy. Some RPA vendors have successfully targeted business units that wanted to implement a solution quickly.

Robotic process automation (RPA) doesn't sneak up on many people anymore. It's already a hot topic in IT and business circles: Gartner pegged RPA as the fastest-growing enterprise software category last year, and there are plenty of other numbers that speak to widespread interest in the technology already. "The RPA market will continue its rapid growth in 2020 as more enterprises come to understand both the power of process automation overall and the number of legacy processes for which RPA is an effective answer," says Aaron Bultman, director of product at Nintex. That said, Bultman and other RPA experts note there are some reality checks in store as organizations build out a broader automation strategy. Some might learn the hard way, for example, that not every process is an ideal fit for RPA.