Presented as part of a meetup on Robotic Process Automation Video: https://youtu.be/WnOURzTkGJA

1. Robotic Process Automation
An Introduction
By Priyabrata Dash
(bobquest33@gmail.com)

2. Agenda
• What is RPA
• Why RPA
• What RPA Can Do
• Key Benefits of RPA
• The RPA Landscape
• The Journey to Robotic Process
Automation
• Stages in RPA Automation
Journey
• RPA Tools Comparison
• Checklist for selecting RPA Tools
• Q & A

3. What is Robotic Process Automation?
• Robotic process automation (RPA) is the
application of technology that allows
employees in a company to configure
computer software or a “robot” to capture
and interpret existing applications for
processing a transaction, manipulating data,
triggering responses and communicating with
other digital systems.
• Any company that uses labor on a large scale
for general knowledge process work, where
people are performing high-volume, highly
transactional process functions, will boost
their capabilities and save money and time
with robotic process automation software.
• Key terms
• Process automation
• IT support and management
• Automated assistant

4. Why Robotic Process
Automation?
• Robotics is growing predominantly, and with
the arrival of bots, enterprises are enjoying
the complete freedom to unlock the full
potential of automation. Challenger start-
ups are now opting automated design
operating models to improve productivity
and increase innovation.
• Recent studies state that nearly 80 million
jobs in US and 15 million jobs in UK are good
to opt automation. This innovation saves
almost 43% of worker’s time. RPA performs
almost every kind of low-end task. This
doesn’t necessarily diminish the human
labour, but it specifically diverts the man
energy into something which is more crucial
and value-added.
• Key Benefits
• Cost Savings
• Enhanced Accuracy
• Scalability
• Operational Efficiency

5. What RPA Can Do?
Typical uses of RPA
• Double-data entry - user
rekeying of data and data
entry is made easy from one
system to another.
• Application migration -
migrates application data and
records as part of an upgrade.
• Automation of reports -
automates data to provide
accurate reports.
• Rule-based decision making -
RPA can handle decision
matrices efficiently and arrive
at simple rule-based decisions
accurately.
• Well-defined Processing -
Automatically enters inputs
from source systems into
target systems.

6. Key Benefits
of RPA

7. The RPA Landscape
• There are Total 12 tools available
currently in the market
• Blue Prism
• Contextor
• EdgeVerve Systems
• Kofax
• Kryon Systems
• NICE
• Pegasystems
• Redwood Software
• Softomotive
• UiPath
• WorkFusion
• Automation Anywhere
• According to Forester research there are
only 3 tools leading in Automation
market: Automation Anywhere, Blue
Prism, And UiPath Lead The Pack

8. The Journey to Robotic Process Automation
Scoping:
• Rapid Piloting in Development Environment.
• Select an enterprise where large number of processes are still
handled manually.
• Identify processes with digital triggers and high volumes with human
exceptions.
Mapping:
• Map the activities, apps, variations, to keystroke level.
• Build a baseline and achieve performance targets accordingly.
• Choose RPA steps in such a way so as to minimize the contact between
humans and robots.
Automation:
• Construct robots to work in an automated standard.
• Employ agile development and on-going testing.
• Define interactions and changes between robots and staff roles.
Testing/Handover:
• Run test cases to identify and capture exceptions.
• Migrate IT functionality to production environment.
• Control on-going execution and support of RPA process.
• Wire in sustainability.
• Plan further.

9. Stages in the Automation Journey
The outcomes of the Pilot:
• Demonstrate the benefits of automation
to pre-described tasks and processes.
• Gauge the effectiveness of RPA
technology with existing systems.
• Highlights the technical and capability
requirements for each automation
program.
• Determine the risk, speed and ease of
implementation.
• Deliver decent financial benefits and
value after each implementation.
• Start the journey towards robotic
workforce.
Key Stages:
• Initialize:
• Establish Sponsorship and governance.
• Choose and deliver initial process and performance.
• Identify and demonstrate the benefits of further processes.
• Industrialize:
• Successful implementation of RPA.
• Formulate organizational changes.
• Observe benefits and define vision.
• Design target model for automation.
• Build baseline performance and case benefits.
• Establish and implement required infrastructure and demand
pipeline.
• Institutionalize:
• Low-cost and high-performance operating model.
• Scale RPA across the enterprise supporting back office functions.
• Embedded virtual workforce with minimal digital performance.
• Continuous improvement and changes in RPA function design.
• Library of reusable objects are established

10. RPA Tools Comparison

11. UI Path
• Uipath comprises of three parts:
• UiPath Studio– UiPath Studio is a highly intuitive visual
processing modeling tool that helps you to design the
process you intend to automate without any effort. The
platform offers numerous best practices templates
enabling users to have complete control over the
automation.
• UiPath Robots–UiPath Robots has front office and back
office bots that execute the processes defined by you.
While the front office robot shares the interface layer
with the human agent who holds control over the
utilization, the back office robot works in batch mode,
without any intervention.
• UiPath Orchestrator – UiPath Orchestrator allows you to
deploy, start, stop, and schedule processes using a
console and track the activities of robots. It offers a single
interface to manage multiple robots that are running in
your system.
• The data will be stored in this tools is SQL server/Oracle
• UI Path is extremely user friendly, it shines in Citrix and was specifically
designed for BPO Automation, based on client insights.
• Below are some key points
• Speed of implementation would be very high but anyone who
has worked on it can sense the delay problem that has to be
improved upon.
• Can be used for various integration services with different
workflow modules hence scoring high on re usability.
• Citrix environment automation and desktop contribute to major
pros of this tool. The architecture of the tool ensures future
proof, meaning it can evolve in unbelievable measures.
• It has a free community edition allowing everyone to download
and learn with umpteen number of learning PDF’s and videos
available online
• Only con is lack of control. No coding. Neither C# nor VB script
can be run.
• UiPath architecture diagram
• References: Uipath user guide

12. Blue Prism
• Blue Prism has taken a simple concept, replicating user activity on the
desktop, and made it enterprise strength.
• The technology is scalable, secure, resilient, and flexible and is
supported by a comprehensive methodology, operational framework
and provided as packaged software.
• The technology is developed and deployed within a “corridor of IT
governance” and has sophisticated error handling and process
modelling capabilities to ensure it can perform at scale within
demanding, highly sophisticated operating environments.
• The combination of SOA/BPMS and Blue Prism Robotic Automation platform
provides almost total coverage of process automation opportunities
• 'Object Studio' is the component where you can develop script for business
process automations
• 'Process studio' is the component where you can test the objects that already
developed in Object studio
• Run and managing the process is monitored by 'Control Room'.
• The data stored in this tool is SQL server
The term Robotic Process Automation was invented by Blue Prism, that itself proves they are
the pioneers in Robotic Process Automation software development. Blue Prism has been
recognized by the American IT research and advisory company They already have more
than 100 customers around the world and partnered with biggest giants like NHS, Accenture,
Hexaware, Hewlett Packard Enterprise, Capgemini, IBM etc.
Below are some key points
•Enterprise grade RPA solution tool with extreme control over activities and point blank
approach towards object creation, coding and automation implementation. Its difficult to go
wrong when coding can be done.
•Speed of implementation can be controlled (which is very high) by anchoring browser based
automation and through, I say it again, coding. Check for element and other features, like
waiting until object exists in a page of a browser with three modes namely, accessibility,
HTML and region mode giving more options and control over selection and accuracy.
•The code insertion part gives Blue Prism an edge over other RPA tools but, other tools like
Automation Anywhere and UI Path have been very successful in making it user friendly.
•Whereas other automation tools are designed very well for some processes and are lacking
in a few others, Blue Prism have the capacity to automate almost anything without any
exception.
•BP has only back office (batch automation / unattended automation) and does not support
front office robots. Front office is also known as attended automation or RDA Robotic
Desktop Automation
•Annual support cost and license cost is higher than other tools.

13. Automation Anywhere
• The RPA tool from automation anywhere is highly metured model
and you can find lot of examples and material on this tool. The
architecture comprises of Client, Bots and Control Room
• Automation Anywhere is software designed to automate virtually any
computer-based process with ease.
• No-programming-required interface makes it possible for anyone in an
organization to quickly and reliably automate tasks of any complexity,
including application integration, IT processes, data extraction and
migration.
• It is available in Standard, Premier, Small Business, and Enterprise
editions.
• The tool capabilities includes: Task to EXE, Job scheduler, Drag-and-drop
task editor, Workflow and process mapping tools, Built-in Windows,
web, and task recorders, Single-click web data extraction capabilities,
and more.
• The data will be stored in this tool is SQL express
• The following five components present in Automation anywhere:
• 1- IIS
• 2- Framework Setup(AA)
• 3- Sql Express/SQL 2014
• 4- Control room setup
• 5- Client installation
•It is a way lot developer friendly tool with a decent
sociability to handle huge volumes
•it offer both front office and back office robots, The front
office is also known as attended automation or RDA
Robotic Desktop Automation
•It is more script based, while UI and BP have visual
process designers. This means you need to have better
programming skills to use AA.
•It has a really smart recorder option which is not present
in Blue Prism. UI element identification works well in both,
but seems more robust in Blue Prism as it considers
multiple factors apart from xy coordinates.
•Automation anywhere robots can be deployed on both
physical attended machines and cloud.

14. WinAutomation
WinAutomation is a powerful and easy to use Windows based platform
for building Software Robots
Main Features
• Software Robot Designer - Automating easier than playing with toy
bricks with the Visual Software Robot Designer point and click
interface.
• Desktop Automation - Automate any desktop application.
• Web Automation - Automate all your web processes easily
leveraging WinAutomation intelligent Web Recorder.
• Macro Recorder - Much more than just a mouse recorder or a
keystroke recorder.
• Concurrency - Effortless automation of all processes with no system
overload.
• Task Scheduler - Schedule any Macro, program, or document to run
at the moment of your need.
• Keyboard Macro - A ‘turn-of-the-millennium’ automation twist to
keyboard functionality.
• UI Designer - Make your own UI for your applications with a touch
of CSS magic.
• Email Automation - Save valuable time and effort from conducting
time-consuming repetitive tasks.
• Excel Automation - Excel Macros have never been easier. Automate pretty much anything with Excel!
• Files & Folders Automation - Do anything with your filesystem, the clever way!
• System Monitoring - Fire Software Robots based on any computer event.
• Auto-Login Professional edition - Run Software Robots even when user is logged out.
• Security Professional edition - Secure your automation processes.
• FTP Automation - Automate your FTPing
• Error Handling - Set-up routines to cover in case of error and bring logic into your automation.
• Add-Ons - Functionality you wish for comes wrapped up in little bundles of joy.
• Robot Compiler Professional edition - White-label and market your Macro.
Other Features
• Automatically fill and submit web forms with data from local files.
• Web Scraping and data extraction from any web page into Excel or text files.
• Prerecord mouse clicks and keystrokes via auto clicker, mouse recorder and keyboard macro
recorder sent to any desktop application.
• Retrieve and parse emails and update a database with the data contained in the emails.
• Copy, move, edit, rename, compress, uncompress and manage files and folders in any possible way.
• Automate FTP transfers: Download and upload files or entire folders at schedule.
• Launch applications, move, resize, close and manipulate windows, take screenshots.
• Read and write data to automate Excel files, connect to SQL databases and manipulate text files.
• Include logic to automate even the most complex tasks.
• Convert tasks into own applications that can be shared with others.
• Run any task using the built-in advanced task scheduler, when you press a hotkey, when a file is
created or deleted, when your site is down or when you receive an email.
• Combine all the above to design custom tasks for your specific needs.
• Twitter Addon

15. Checklist for
selecting RPA
Tools
There is no “the best RPA tool” as such. It all depends on the requirements and needs of a person and what they are
looking for. There are a huge variety of factors in which all the tools differ from each other in. List of key factors that
influence a business Organization’s decision to make the purchase can be broadly classified into the following:
Technology: First and foremost is the technology in which RPA tool has been built, like Microsoft .NET, IBM
Mainframe, Java, web etc. The tool has to be platform independent, considering many of the organizations perform
their day to day tasks outside the local desktop using Citrix or Virtual machines etc. So the Automation solution
should be able to support any application and platform.
Interface (Ease of Use): Next most important feature is the RPA tool’s user interface. A complex user interface will
delay the process of implementation and increase the learning curve and adaptability. A more user friendly interface
like drag and drop, auto capture, image recognition etc. would be better.
Management: t is important to know how effectively and easily the robots can be managed considering these
robots are going to be replacing your human workforce. There should be a high level of visibility and control in
terms of process monitoring, process change, development, re-use etc.
Security: How safe are the robots when compared to the humans? After all robots/RPA tools are also a piece of
software, so how much more security controls can be implemented, test the code rigidly and lock it up, the better.
Automation solutions that supports the compliance process (like HIPPA – For Healthcare industry, SOX – Financial
Sector, PCI DSS – Credit card related organization etc.) are some of the factors to be considered in terms of security.
Total License & Maintenance Costs
Integrations
Vendor Support

16. Thank You & QA