Automation Anywhere Reviews

We deployed Automation Anywhere for our clients. It is used for tasks like HR, procurement, supply chain, visa processing, client onboarding, etc. 

Productivity increased when we implemented Automation Anywhere, but it did not meet the client's expectations regarding the number of human workers it replaced. We are currently trying to optimize it to use the maximum potential channels and identify ways to improve performance.

The clients are willing to use AI. They are conservative about it but still progressing in that direction.  The integration of Automation Anywhere into our clients' workflows, APIs, business applications, and documents was seamless, but it was a bit of a struggle until we realized that it has a built-in integration platform. Using the platform, we could define the process so that it also does downstream automation as well. 

Automation Anywhere's central command center is good. We've used Automation Anywhere's AI copilot. It can integrate with around 70 to 80 percent of our client's applications. There are still issues with the other 20 to 30 percent. 

We had some issues with screen-scaping and recording. Also, some of the components are not user-friendly enough compared to UiPath. The learning curve isn't very long if you come from a programming background, but it may be difficult for someone without a technical background to understand. 

We used Automation Anywhere for two years. 

Automation Anywhere is stable. 

Automation Anywhere is quite scalable.

I rate Automation Anywhere support eight out of ten. We get support from local partners. It's good. 

Positive

We also use UiPath. It depends on the client's preference.

The initial setup was complex, but upgrading the automations was easy. The bots require some monitoring. It isn't more than an hour daily. We check to see if there are any issues or whether a process has gotten stuck. That's rare. 

I rate Automation Anywhere seven out of ten. There are many more tools on the market that are much better than automation anywhere.

We work with partners to implement the application on several customer sites, typically banking, financial security, and insurance. We work as a service provider. It's used, for example, in the banking sector to handle processes and tasks. It helps automate. 

We've implemented more than 3,000 business processes for customers. 

It helps improve performance and helps companies save time and money. Customers have been very happy with the experience so far. We've saved about 10% to 15% of time and costs. One robot can help replace a portion of the workforce. 

The security on offer is very good. 

AI has big potential right now. We're trying to support organizations that want to integrate it. We're trying to increase AI capabilities.

It's a pretty easy solution to use for business users that are not technical. They can learn the tool very fast. In maybe six weeks, even with no previous experience, they can go to the market to implement the service for the client. After a while, they can become very proficient in using it. 

It's easy to integrate with other applications. We can integrate automation into workflow APIs, business applications, et cetera. 

The product has helped increase productivity. 

There could be more training provided by Automation Anywhere. 

We've faced some economic problems based on the exchange rate. 

A major impediment to using CoPilot is that many of our users cannot access the cloud. They need to work with the on-premises version. 

I've used the solution for five years, since 2019.

The solution is stable. 

The solution has been scalable. 

Technical support is good. 

Positive

I'm also familiar with UiPath and IBM RPA.

How easy or difficult the setup is depends on the customer's level of knowledge. Most of our clients are in banking and require on-premises deployments. Even government entities cannot use the cloud. We are comfortable with deployments and find the process to be straightforward.  Sometimes it is difficult to upgrade from older versions. 

We have five people out of a team of 13 that can handle any maintenance. Maybe 20% of our team would be involved in maintenance. 

The pricing of the solution is flexible. 

We did compare Automation Anywhere with UiPath. Automation Anywhere could offer more marketing and training. 

I'm aware of the CoPilot feature. However, we do not have clients using it. We're trying to introduce the tool to the market and to the customer. However, it has the potential to be a good application. 

I'd rate the solution ten 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.

I use Automation Anywhere to automate multiple desktop applications for data filling, data collection, and information downloading.

Automation Anywhere assists customers in building automation to streamline workflows where they require multiple tools, thereby saving valuable time.

The learning curve to train semi-technical people is around one month.

Automation Anywhere saves us costs. To have a human perform the same job would cost four times as much. The solution also replaces humans in repetitive, tedious tasks, thereby enhancing employee satisfaction. We observed the benefits within the initial four months of usage.

Automation Anywhere's capability to automate critical scenarios for delivering scalable automation is absolutely solid.

The integration of RPA bots, APIs, business applications, and documents in Automation Anywhere are integral components.

Automation Anywhere has helped our organization increase its automation utilization. Prior to using Automation Anywhere, we needed four employees to accomplish the work that can now be done by just one with the help of Automation Anywhere.

Automation Anywhere's image reader is the most valuable feature.

AI would enable improved automation and faster training times that would be reduced from one month to one week.

I have been using Automation Anywhere for almost six years.

The stability of Automation Anywhere is the best among all these automation solutions.

Automation Anywhere excels at scalability. We can effortlessly deploy thousands of machines. I give the scalability of Automation Anywhere a nine out of ten.

We provide our own support and do not depend on Automation Anywhere's support.

Neutral

The initial setup is complex, primarily because of the time required for the first deployment. The deployment takes one hour. First, we need to ensure that the infrastructure is correct, install the automation workflow, and then implement each of the workflows on them. Afterward, it should be run for one to two days before handing it over to the employees. Two DevOps administrators are needed for the deployment.

We implement Automation Anywhere in-house.

Our organization has seen up to four times the return on investment.

Automation Anywhere is expensive, making it suitable only for enterprise organizations. Although there are more affordable solutions available, they lack the comprehensive features of Automation Anywhere and cannot scale to meet the demands of large organizations.

I rate Automation Anywhere an eight out of ten.

It is challenging for non-technical individuals to utilize Automation Anywhere. Automation flows are authored by humans, making it impossible for non-technical individuals to directly program Automation Anywhere.

I also use Blue Prism and UiPath alongside Automation Anywhere.

For someone who wants to use API integration instead of robotic process automation, it is important to note that APIs cannot be utilized in all desktop integrations. As more individuals transition to the cloud, it is recommended to employ a combination of both APIs and robotic processes.

Automation Anywhere is deployed on 100 hosts, each with 100 users.

We offer a periodic maintenance review for the individuals utilizing the solution to ensure the functionality of the workflows we have implemented. The maintenance process requires the involvement of three individuals.

Five percent of the time is spent on maintaining bots.

There are several scenarios that function well when we design the workflow, but they do not function properly in the production environment due to intermittent issues that may occur with the specific host. Consequently, it is essential to always take into account the type of host and ensure that it can handle special cases automatically, relieving the burden from the workflow creators.

We use Automation Anywhere in our HR department for onboarding and attendance verification. We also utilize it in our Finance department for bank transaction reconciliation, and in our assets department for multiple data entry of assets in the system.

Automation Anywhere has helped us integrate different data entry systems.

It has a low learning curve and can be utilized for traditional automation with minimal training.

Automation Anywhere has saved hundreds of working hours per year for our organization.

It is capable of providing automation on a large scale. The technology is remarkable.

In the latest release of Automation Anywhere, version 360, new features have been included to facilitate connectivity with APIs, RPA bots, business applications, and documents. Additionally, users can now leverage their own language and Python for enhanced functionality.

Automation Anywhere has helped our organization increase the consumption of automation.

The most valuable aspect of Automation Anywhere is its ease of use.

The optical character recognition of various documents and templates, particularly when using the Arabic language, has room for improvement.

The technical support has room for improvement.

I have been using Automation Anywhere for three years.

With the new release, Automation Anywhere is extremely stable.

Automation Anywhere is scalable and capable of adapting to any new requirements and technologies.

The initial setup requires some expertise. We formed a team to handle the preparation, installation, and configuration of the platform internally.

The implementation was completed in-house.

The pricing for Automation Anywhere is reasonable.

I would rate Automation Anywhere an eight out of ten. I appreciate their solution, as they continuously improve by addressing the gaps.

In Concentrix, my role is as an asset manager. It's very much focused on the RPA practice globally, which is why we come from enablement to delivery and support. End-to-end is something that is managed by me.

One thing I really like about Automation Anywhere is the product has actually taken leaps in the last three years. We started with the conventional RPA type of use cases. But, in the last two years, with the help of IQ Bot, and what I learned today about this Attended Automation 2.0, I think they are addressing vital key challenges that we have faced so far. The description on top of the description is what their model is. They're partnering with us in this journey of transformation. The type of technology advancement that they have done will certainly help us a lot.

They are constantly being in the BPO space and BPO and RPA are something which go hand in hand in technology. It is the right space for the utilization of this technology in the industry. While our customers are also asking for us for this technology benefit for the revenue benefit, productivity benefit, efficiency, etc. In the last two years, we have leveraged it for multiple clients, whether for telecom, healthcare or other spaces, it has been a very strong partnership that has really helped us.

RPA is something which was their best product. It was easy to config, easy to record, and deploy on the floor. With their IQ Bot, I am very much convinced that was the area where we started tapping unconventional use cases, like machine learning, artificial intelligence, and all those things bundled together. With this cognitive capability, we went from 30 to 40 percent use cases which we are able to address and have leaped over to a wider space of 50 to 60 percent with this cognitive bot.

There are many things which I have liked in the last couple of months that I have seen in Automation Anywhere. Something that really excites me is the new release of Attended Automation 2.2. It's a very lightweight solution. When I'm talking about the automation of the size from 2,000 to 20,000, and everyone is using the attended bot with this scale and thin client model, we can easily deploy and scale it out to the larger corporate size. So, this product is very unique and I have not seen it in any of Automation Anywhere's competitors. They came out with it.

The product is quite stable. I don't know how to code the the other products which we have used. One thing with the bot that we are always with struggling is the memory management. The Automation Anywhere product is quite stable in that perspective. Security and other things are very well managed by Automation Anywhere. The third piece is the architecture is very much centrally governed. This makes this product more robust.

In the last two years, one thing which Automation Anywhere has changed and they actually worked on is the support and enablement part. That will be the key game changer for them. Because if I compare them with other competitors who are in the space of Automation Anywhere, the customer experience (where we are the customer) is there when you need them. The support is available on time. That is where I think Automation Anywhere is wonderful.

It was very straightforward. I don't know if it was because of the training which was given or if it was because of the application itself, but it was very straightforward to start the journey of RPA using Automation Anywhere. Whether it's a complex use case or low complex use case, I think Automation Anywhere does give you that flexibility that you can start your journey seamlessly.

One thing that we are just changing now: When this automation journey started, everyone was talking about ROI. E.g., I'm investing X amount into the technology, and I'm now trying to cannibalize on efficiency. We are not leveraging automation just for cost reduction. The business is now leveraging automation to get it into this space where we were not able to get so far. So, the dimensions of ROI are not only cost reduction. The dimension of all ROI have been changed to scalability, compliance, some other new business go-to market strategies, etc. Those things are very much changed from the way it was here previously.

This is tricky. We all know who is in the quadrant and the leading there. In the last five years, we actually worked closely with them. Everyone does have their own pluses and minuses. But, if I talk about Automation Anywhere, their cognitive bot is one of their unique selling points.

We are able to sell it very easily compared to its competitors. Another piece is the stability part. The third piece is something which is the customer experience: The ease to work with it. The Automation Anywhere, as a partner, is very easy to work with. They are there when you need them, whether you are in the initial journey of automation, you are figuring out what is the right opportunity, or whether you are in the journey of deploying the bot or support. They are there with you at each of those stages.

These things really make them different compared to their competitors. I'm sure if they will continue focusing on these they will be leading in this space.

So far, it's a 10 (out of 10). If there's anything which will change, I will let you know. But so far, the experience with Automation Anywhere in the last two and a half years has been wonderful. My best wishes to the team.

I use it to develop for the HR domain, where I am using Oracle PeopleSoft and Salesforce applications. Mostly, I use the object cloning command and Excel operations. 

I work in a banking company. We use Automation Anywhere for global HR payroll operations and payslip-related automation. We have also automated hedge loans and credit card approvals.

We use versions 10.3 and 11. Compared to 10.3, version 11 is good and easier to automate because they introduced more options. You can also automate complex things. They introduced the Control Room feature too. 

It is installed on-premise at our company.

We are using Automation Anywhere for our leave approval process. We used to have three FTEs on the day shift working on this process. Now, we only have one FTE working on the leave approval process. The bot supports everything else in the process. With this bot, we are saving the cost of two FTEs.

• OCR
• Object cloning
• Excel automation
• Reusable
• Scalability
• Code free

Most back-end operations start with Excel. With Automation Anywhere, we can easily automate the CSV in Excel operations. It is integrated with Microsoft Office 365.

The Control Room feature is very good.

We are using Taskbot for attended automation and unattended automation.

From the Bot Store, we can download bots. We can analyze the code. I have downloaded some bots just for coding standard purposes.

I would like more integration with Microsoft Excel. More screenshots that can be integrated with Excel would help our customers too. It is good that Automation Anywhere is now willing to partner with Microsoft.

I need to be able to work on Citrix with the solution. 

I need cloud-based applications. Now, we are manually running the application.

The stability is good.

The scalability is perfect. It is a reusable product.

We have around 200 bots in the entire company. We have allocated separate systems for these bots. We have almost 350 processors that we have automated using the bots. 

I have not used their technical support.

I was not involved in the initial setup.

For the bot creation process, we have a solution architecture team. They will analyze the process and check for feasibility before proceeding to next level. They'll check whether the process can be automated, then prepare a document which will come to me. Then, I'll try to make the SDLC. I'll check whether the process is possible, then we'll go for development. This is the structure:

1. Analysis and feasibility study.
2. Documents preparation.
3. Development.
4. UAT.
5. Deployment.

There's a process requirement. If I get request today, it will take some two to three months to develop and close the incident.

A cost savings example is processing parental leave applications. The volume per day that one FTE can do is eight or nine applications. When using Automation Anywhere, we can do 15 applications per day. Another thing is the improvement in accuracy and reduction in errors.

I like Automation Anywhere better than UiPath because you can review the drag and drop activity. You can also review the code line by line. 

We are not using any other tools as we are partners with Automation Anywhere.

I used to work on UiPath. Automation Anywhere can easily be adopted and learnt. UiPath requires some programming skills and knowledge. Compared to UiPath, Automation Anywhere is easy to learn with its drag and drop commands. In UiPath, the commands were difficult to work with and also architecture. 

Recently, Automation Anywhere introduced its cloud-based Control Room, where you can monitor the bot. Also, Automation Anywhere recently launched a mobile application, which UiPath doesn't have. 

Automation Anywhere has Credential Manager.

You can easily build and deploy the bots with it.

Train more people on a team to understand the tool to build teamwork. Share the development tasks.

Automation Anywhere has plugins for Excel, but we haven't integrated it with Oracle.

I have taken Automation Anywhere University courses. I am certified in Automation Anywhere. I have the Advanced certification and am now doing the Masters certification. The courses were good and helpful for anyone wants to learn about Automation Anywhere. Everything is on the website, e.g., information about installation, configuration, bot development, and bot assessment. 

Automation Anywhere and RPA are not that difficult to learn. It can be learnt and be adopted easily, but you need at minimum practical knowledge. You need to take courses and scenarios. E.g., even if I know about object cloning, I still have to go and work with object cloning to understand the possibilities of object cloning.

We are not using IQ Bot.

Task schedules and runs are good candidates for bot automation.

We are a biotech company. We make medicines to cure cancers. 

We use Automation Anywhere for intelligence automation or robotic process automation. So, we use it finance, accounting, and supply chain. We are actual using it across multiple functions in the company.

We have automated a number of processes in accounting and finance: month-end close, eliminating profits, reconciliation, some in HR, some in operations, inventory to sell, and various other finance and account processes.

The most valuable feature for Automation Anywhere is that it enables developers to build bots and feel like they can contribute.

I love the Bot Store. I encourage a lot of my staff to use it, because it changes the game and the time that it takes to build automation. It has a lot of reusable things that you can use off the bat.

My impressions of the front office attended automation are that it really changes the game from automation which doesn't have high value. It can actually help people organically build automation. It helps change the game for more wide spread use.

I would like to see a lot around API integration going forward, like the ability for other systems to talk to the AI better by opening it up. I would like to see more chatbots or anything in the journey of making it truly immersive for human workers working with these bots.

There are a couple things that have room for improvement: Its openness and more APIs should be exposed to allow people to integrate. How do you make it easier to integrate back with this technology?

I would like it to do more predict, which means if I have a thousand bots in product, how do I check which of the bots may be at risk of failing? This would really help in supporting the bots when scaling the programs.

The more later versions that you implement, the better that they get. Any enterprise software has its gaps, but it is how quickly it is being addressed. In the latest versions, it has become much better compared to what was there in the past. 

We have them implemented in a cloud-based environment. Cloud by itself allows you to scale. As long as the software works there, it allows you to really scale.

To scale from pilots to the current number of bots that we are using, it took three to six months. That was the time frame. We started pilots on some functions, and learning from our pilots was key.

There is definitely some room for improvement there. It is sort of a hit and miss with their support engineers, you have some really good ones and some that aren't. Consistency is the key. There is room to get consistent. I am giving them the feedback, because as you get more customers, support becomes the linchpin where you can either drive a customer away or get them to use the product more.

For the last year, we were really focused around using it for the right purposes and processes. We have had fragmented solutions, then we decided to pick one player. We already had the tool (Automation Anywhere). It was more about doubling down on our investment on one product, then really getting good at using it. 

We have had the solution for a long time. As you go to cloud-based solutions, there are some nuances, which is less about the initial setup and more about when you have a version that you need to migrate or update. This is an area where we have faced some hiccups, but we were able to get around them.

We used a combination of an integrator and consultant for the deployment. We have used many different companies who are premium partners with Automation Anywhere, and we are also focused on building a COE internally, so we can do some of it ourselves. 

We measure ROI by a number of factors: 

• Hard savings from cost dollars
• Looking at the NPV over number of years.
• Labor
• What control or compliance things that we could be saving.
• Productivity
• Employee satisfaction. 

Roughly, as of today, it is around $250,000 annually.

We had literally everything under the sun, like WorkFusion and UiPath. It was more about focusing on Automation Anywhere, and only if we hit a roadblock that the solution could not solve, then we should look at the other tools.

I would say that they are a nine out of ten. Because if they are a ten, then they sit back and relax. To get a ten, there are some small tweaks to be done. I think the company is going in the right direction. It just needs more focused attention in certain small gaps, then they will get there.

The ease of use is its key novel feature. It is much better than earlier versions. I have actually trained people in finance who have not written a piece of code in their lives. They are able to pick it up. There is a learning curve, some it takes them some time, but it is definitely easy for them to use. I have a couple of folks who have not done automation before, and now they are able to go back to their jobs where we used to build automation for functions. They can now understand what we built for them and actually contribute to a certain extent for it.

Get started with the tool. Think of the structure because using the technology is not the problem, it is more on the governance and how to use it. How can you maximize your benefits that you are receiving? It is about getting your hands dirty and trying it on small PoCs. That is how we started; we started on small PoCs. That's the key.