What is RPA?

Robotic Process Automation (RPA) is an automation technology that uses software bots to manipulate systems and applications at the user interface-level. Robots interact with systems the same way a human user does—clicking buttons, typing login credentials into a website, reading PDFs, and so on.

Opportunities for automation exist virtually anywhere because RPA is scalable, flexible, and efficiently integrates workflows across systems, applications, and departments.

Key Benefits of RPA Solutions

Robotic process automation solutions boost productivity, improve accuracy, and help your organization grow by giving repetitive, manual workloads to software robots. With RPA software, you can:

Mimic Manual Tasks

Free up your human workforce to do more strategic work that adds value to your business.

Automate Integrations

Leverage a central automation platform without expensive hardware tools to automate integrations between systems, applications, and workflows.

Enable Innovation & Collaboration

Foster innovation between IT and business teams by centralizing automation and connecting data with detailed analytics.

Scale Your Digital Workforce

Use software robots as an easy, cost-effective way to configure and work alongside human employees to enable rapid growth.

RPA Technology: The Four Ways to Use RPA

Learn more about RPA and explore the different types of robotic process automation in our free white paper.

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What is an RPA Software Robot?

Robots in business didn’t come out of nowhere. The truth is that this is a new name for a familiar concept. Software robots, or bots, usually refer to what most people know as agents—individual devices running the automation solution. Some RPA vendors also use the term robot to refer to an automated process, or even to each occurrence of a process, although these definitions are less common.

A robot can be installed on a PC, a physical server, or a virtual machine. While a robot can be configured for an endless variety of tasks, they can be divided into two distinct types: attended and unattended robots. RPA allows for seamless integration of attended and unattended processes.

Attended Robots

Attended automation includes processes where humans are involved at some point in the process. This could be filling out a form, clicking a button and more. These bots take over certain tasks in the workflow, freeing up the human workforce to tackle the more rewarding work.

Unattended Robots

Robotic process automation is also a great candidate for the unattended or background processes that keep a company running. These are processes executed where no human intervention is needed. Examples include file transfers, generating reports, or monitoring systems.

The key to scaling your digital workforce is employing highly flexible, optimized software robots. Automate robots are enterprise-grade digital workers that offload, support, and augment existing business processes and workflows. Some of the most popular types of automation bots include:

Data Management Connector

Harness the power of big data with connectors that extract, manipulate, and utilize data from sources and applications on premise or in the cloud. Automatically write to a database, business application, or report.

IT Services Connector

Use robotic process automation to respond to common repetitive requests like password resets. Monitor systems, receive automatic, real-time notification of problems, and report on and analyze your IT services.

User Provisioning Connector

Software connectors bring together the various applications throughout HR, IT, payroll and other departments to streamline user provisioning and take the headaches out of onboarding new employees or handling change requests.

Claims Processing Connector

Let your software robots streamline each step in your claims processing workflow—processing forms, validating eligibility, notification, payment, and more. Eliminate human error with RPA.

Human Resources Connector

Leverage Active Directory automation for swift onboarding, offboarding, or account management. Scrape data and information from forms, automatically email managers and other leadership, gather signatures, and integrate HR processes.

Accounts Payable Connector

Automatically process invoices upon arrival. Extract and manipulate data and information from paper forms and configure custom connectors to manage your organization's unique Accounts Payable workflow.

Browse 200+ automation connectors that are preconfigured and available for free download on the Automation Connector Hub.

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What's the Difference Between RPA and AI?

Robotic Process Automation (RPA) and Artificial Intelligence (AI) are different technologies for different tasks. RPA tools use software bots to interact with systems the same way a human user does, like clicking buttons and extracting data. AI tools perform tasks that normally require human thought to complete such as data classification and categorization for intelligent process automation.

RPA is great at handling unstructured data that is organized, clearly defined, and searchable—like Excel spreadsheets and forms. AI can tackle your unstructured data that is more qualitative—like transcripts and email messages—and make that data more useable across your organization.

Many businesses are starting to combine RPA technology with AI-driven software like intelligent document processing to help maintain control of critical data with more speed and accuracy to supercharge automation efforts.

RPA Tools for Any Industry

Organizations across every sector and function are turning to RPA to optimize resources and maximize efficiency—from healthcare to financial services and insurance to human resources and call center automation. RPA bots can easily manage processes spanning departments, locations, and systems—on premise or in the cloud.

Healthcare

Banking & Finance

Insurance

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How to Implement RPA Solutions

No matter where you are in your RPA implementation process—from getting ready to implement your first software bots to increasing your competitive edge through strategic automation—we've developed a comprehensive library of resources for every step of the way. Click on an implementation step below to get started.

Assess Automation Opportunities

The key to automation success is finding the right place to start. While you may be tempted to start big and try to automate everything, it’s important to start small. Take a look at some of your most tedious, repetitive processes that take up the valuable time you could be spending on more strategic work. Learn More >

Execute a Proof of Concept

Once you have an RPA project in mind, it’s time to prove its worth. Schedule time with our automation experts for a free, 4-hour proof of concept to go over your current process, your vision for the future, and the criteria for successful completion. Learn More >

Plan your Center of Excellence

Digitally transforming your business with automation is about more than just the tools. A center of excellence framework will help you identify the key people, processes, and technology necessary to maximize the benefits of RPA. Learn More >

Frequently Asked Questions About RPA

What is an RPA bot?

Bots are agents that interpret and execute tasks on a human’s behalf to handle repetitive tasks. Bots can run based on triggers, schedules, or work nonstop. Attended bots go into action when a user commands them to run and unattended bots work behind the scenes and are triggered by an action. Learn More >

What types of processes can I automate with RPA?

RPA software can transform virtually any business or IT process—the possibilities are endless! Common use cases include automating data scraping and extraction, report generation and distribution, web browser tasks, batch processing, and much more. Learn More >

Do you need to know how to code to use RPA?

No! Look for RPA tools with a screen recorder that converts user interactions like keystrokes, mouse clicks, and more, into automation. Pre-built automation actions and pre-configured bots can also help you quickly and easily build automation without writing any code. Learn More >

What’s the difference between RPA and BPA?

RPA is a technology where robots manipulate and communicate with business systems and applications on the user-interface level. While business process automation (BPA) automates the steps of an entire process and automatically triggers step-by-step to create an entire workflow. Look for solutions that provide both forms of automation to create a more robust strategy. Learn More >

How do I get started with RPA?

With the right tools and a solid strategy, it’s easy to get started with RPA at any organization. We recommend starting small with an easy-win RPA project to start building ROI. Check out our guide to learn the 6 steps of a successful RPA implementation. Learn More >

How is RPA part of digital transformation?

RPA is a great foundation to kick off your digital transformation efforts. RPA transforms how people work and generates quick ROI and momentum that will propel your digital transformation efforts forward. Learn More >

RPA Resources & Videos

Dive deeper into the benefits of automation with the following resources:

Guide

Processes to Automate

A series of short videos demonstrating popular use cases

RPA Success Stories

A series of short videos on how various organizations use RPA

Begin Your RPA Journey

A series of videos to help you start your RPA journey

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Robotic Process Automation (RPA) Solutions