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Senior RPA Developer at Ernst & Young
Real User
Easy tool to use and learn that doesn't require much expertise
Pros and Cons
  • "The tool is very easy to use and mostly user-friendly. I like that when using it I don't need much expertise."
  • "There is still a way to go for Automation Anywhere where we can see improvement. Mostly, we want to see more artificial intelligence and machine learning. Now, I can see only this mostly in the IQ Bot where we construct the data from PDFs. I also want to see more features where we can use the artificial intelligence in automating tasks as well."

What is our primary use case?

I lead the automation team in UI. In the UI, we automate mostly PDF and shared devices, then most web applications. For large volumes, we mostly automate PDFs.

What is most valuable?

I have enjoyed using all the features of this tool, not just one feature, e.g., object cloning, Excel automation, and the web recorder. 

The tool is very easy to use and mostly user-friendly. I like that when using it I don't need much expertise.

What needs improvement?

With the IQ Bots that use AI, I want to see more features using that type of machine learning and artificial intelligence in their products.

For how long have I used the solution?

I have been using Automation Anywhere for the past four to five years. I started using Automation Anywhere from version 7, and now, it's version 11. So, I've seen the journey from version 7 to 11.
Buyer's Guide
Automation Anywhere
October 2024
Learn what your peers think about Automation Anywhere. Get advice and tips from experienced pros sharing their opinions. Updated: October 2024.
814,560 professionals have used our research since 2012.

What do I think about the scalability of the solution?

It is a very scalable product. With the market, every time and every day, we can scale it.

How are customer service and support?

It is very easy to interact with the support team for Automation Anywhere whenever it's required. Sometimes, if the training is required, they would visit our premises. We can also visit their premises. In terms of training and product support, if you have any challenges as a developer, they help all the time. It is very easy to connect with them.

How was the initial setup?

It is very straightforward.

What other advice do I have?

I have seen a huge difference in how it is improving products.

I use them mostly. I would recommend it to all my friends and team. I encourage team member to use it, even those who are not from a technical background. They can also move to Automation Anywhere, use, and can learn from it. If they go to use Automation Anywhere University and other training tools, the training materials are available for them. So, it's very easy to learn as well. Different platforms and technology members have also moved to use the RPA platform, and are now using the Automation Anywhere tool.

I'd give it a nine point two out of 10. There is still a way to go for Automation Anywhere where we can see improvement. Mostly, we want to see more artificial intelligence and machine learning. Now, I can see only this mostly in the IQ Bot where we construct the data from PDFs. I also want to see more features where we can use the artificial intelligence in automating tasks as well.

Disclosure: PeerSpot contacted the reviewer to collect the review and to validate authenticity. The reviewer was referred by the vendor, but the review is not subject to editing or approval by the vendor. The reviewer's company has a business relationship with this vendor other than being a customer: Partner.
PeerSpot user
Project Manager at ANZ Banking Group
Real User
Saves us man-hours, headcount, and processing time
Pros and Cons
  • "We have automated the equivalent headcount of 500 FTEs since we started. Those people haven't been laid off. They are just doing different types of work activities."
  • "We have been looking at processes which can easily transition into a large scale environment, where you can have cloud or hybrid model. However, being a bank, some of our processes are critical and we would like to hold those on-premise. This limits us with our usage of Automation Anywhere."

What is our primary use case?

Being a bank, we have a lot of processes which we have automated. I am a Project Manager for HR functions. The majority of my processes are in terms of income and skills processing. Those are all automated.

How has it helped my organization?

We were one of the few to start up this journey with Automation Anywhere. Interestingly, the majority of our processes were determined to be boring. People did not find them to be very interesting. Those processes have been automated. Being a bank, we have some sensitive processes which we cannot automate. Those processes have been given to human intellectuals. Otherwise, the majority of our processes are automated.

It has boosted our processing time by seven times. Typically, something that has taken eight to 10 minutes now can be done in two to three minutes. So, we have seen some value-add there. 

Resources are being processed earlier and involved in a different type of a governing kind of role. This sort of builds a layer for them to move and scale up. The solution is fast and easy to deploy. Our use cases lasts for two to three sprints and we can churn out solutions very fast.

What is most valuable?

We do not have a server type of an environment. We use a desktop version of Automation Anywhere which is easily customizable and quickly built-in. We do not have to go through major security iOS applications, etc. These are all enterprise applications that we have onboarded. Each of our functions take their responsibility of building their bot and deploying it. 

It is fast and reliable. 

What needs improvement?

Older versions of Automation Anywhere required specific skill sets to use it. It is no longer like that.

The version A2019 GUI allows you to drop and drop.

For how long have I used the solution?

We started our journey in 2013 or 2014.

What do I think about the stability of the solution?

As far as version 10.1 is concerned, we have been using it for the last two years. It is okay. As an organization, we look forward to next version. However, being a bank, we have certain processes that we have to follow. We are happy with the version that we are using and haven't experience downtime.

What do I think about the scalability of the solution?

We have been looking at processes which can easily transition into a large scale environment, where you can have cloud or hybrid model. However, being a bank, some of our processes are critical and we would like to hold those on-premise. This limits us with our usage of Automation Anywhere.

How are customer service and technical support?

The support that we receive from Automation Anywhere is really good.

We have specific customer success managers as a platinum partner. We have support extended to us when we have any type of concerns and issues. 

How was the initial setup?

The initial setup was very straightforward. It didn't really affect our processes at any levels, which really helped. The process was fast and easy.

The support team kept our team calm.

What about the implementation team?

We have an in-house Automation Anywhere team who supports us.

What was our ROI?

It saves us man-hours, headcount, and processing time.

We have automated the equivalent headcount of 500 FTEs since we started. Those people haven't been laid off. They are just doing different types of work activities.

Which other solutions did I evaluate?

We did not evaluate other vendors beside Automation Anywhere. 

Automation Anywhere was a pioneer in the market at the time that we were evaluating vendors. It was a good match.

What other advice do I have?

Explore the new version A2019 that is coming out. It is user-friendly and can be onboarded quickly.

I would love to use the next version A2019 that is coming out.

Disclosure: I am a real user, and this review is based on my own experience and opinions.
PeerSpot user
Buyer's Guide
Automation Anywhere
October 2024
Learn what your peers think about Automation Anywhere. Get advice and tips from experienced pros sharing their opinions. Updated: October 2024.
814,560 professionals have used our research since 2012.
Senior Consultant at a financial services firm with 10,001+ employees
Real User
Helps manipulate and manage data from multiple sources while improving automation
Pros and Cons
  • "I'd say there are new useful features that will definitely help us as we do more development in the near future."
  • "There are a number of current tools which can be improved because they have many limitations. Like some better controls in emails, and better support for features in Excel and PDF."

What is our primary use case?

Our primary use for this solution is mainly to support our email vertical, so it helps automate the management of financial, commercial and operations between our multiple domains using logistics and libraries and data points.

We just use it to get data from different sources and massage some data with some specific protocol. After that, we simply have to put back the data. It is a system for data treatment and to notify the proper business handler.

How has it helped my organization?

The product has helped our organization tool-wise to expand capabilities and offerings. To keep it short and simple, I'd say there are useful features that will definitely help us as we do more development in the near future.

What is most valuable?

The most valuable feature is that we can automate data manipulations. We can save IP's, we can save time, we can use manual reports. The main benefit of this tool is that it is a robust solution.

The feature I think that helps most is the ability to integrate. There is SAP integrations, SAP application integration, web application integrations, and email integrations. We have multiple features — there are a lot of features. They are also very good features which enable us to do many things.

What needs improvement?

What may be able to be improved is that sometimes there'll be a connection that is not from our clients and servers and that's a situation they may want to address. The solution for that may need to be built differently based on the needs from organization to organization. In that case, it is not particularly or specifically about the tool. It is just something I could see they might help enable.

That the product is now available as a cloud-based solution is a good feature that they added. So with that and new features already coming out, I don't have a lot of suggestions. I will have to work on this new version, then let's see if there's something I think they need to add.

There are a number of current tools which can be improved because they have many limitations. Like some better controls in emails, and better support for features in Excel and PDF. Especially things like that which I need more than new features.

I'll be enabling the current features, but I'll have to see them and what they do before I can feedback more.

What do I think about the stability of the solution?

The product is not totally stable. I feel like it could be improved on in that way. It's just stable, not very stable, and that's the difference.

The problem is mainly handling enterprise data. There can be connections which are not the nature you would expect. It is not from the client or the server but something else. There can be performance issues.

What do I think about the scalability of the solution?

Scalability is a trend we are experiencing in IT. We have to have a scope for a project and we have to create a scope again in the future millennia. So I'm waiting just to see the functionality of the additional features in this package.

How are customer service and technical support?

We have never had to use the technical support as we were able to work with and implement the product. We act as consultants and supply technical support to clients.

How was the initial setup?

I do not think it is straightforward to start working with this product. It's a little complex to start out working in the database. After this when you gain a little experience with the product, then you will understand it and be able to smooth out your processes and how you approach development and it will be easier.

What about the implementation team?

We are a consulting organization, so we have experience with this product now. We have started up administration for the solution for many other clients. We did not use an external reseller or integrator and did everything in-house or ourselves. So we have worked it both ways: we did our own deployment and then we did deployments for other organizations.

Right now we are just mainly focusing on our internal development with our workforce only.

What other advice do I have?

On a scale of one to ten, one being the worst and ten being the best, I would rate Automation Anywhere as an eight.

Now they have a nice tool that is mostly stable with most of the features I could want being covered in the functionality of the product. More features are coming soon with this release so that's why I rated it an eight. The product right now will probably be better with the release.

I think it would be very difficult to consider the product a nine or a ten. To reach that level and to connect with innovations in the technology that are coming is very hard to anticipate and solve. There is always a limitation to what they can develop at once, so they will delay some work.

If I'm talking to a user who is not comfortable with automation tools, I recommend that they try the Automation Anywhere tool only. It's very easy to learn and easy to implement. It is not something you are making a sacrifice to use. It is a good tool.

Disclosure: I am a real user, and this review is based on my own experience and opinions.
PeerSpot user
Real User
Anybody can develop a bot by themselves
Pros and Cons
  • "It lets users add value with their time other than focusing on downloading Excel files, consolidating, and drawing up formulas. Since everything is structured, these easily are incorporated into the bot's work."
  • "In the version that we have, there are some challenges with the browser-based applications, the cloning of the objects, and the solution's stability."

What is our primary use case?

We wanted to automate as many business processes as possible within the finance organization since the office that we work in today is called the finance transformation office. We transform all the business processes of finance for a better, simpler, scalable finance organization. We are constantly pursuing transformation of the finance organization as far as Cisco's changing dynamic business models. We are a predominantly product-oriented organization. We transformed our business models from products to software and subscription-based business model.

How has it helped my organization?

Users can develop for themselves. This is the end stage goal for our organization: To have our finance users developing automation for themselves. Automation Anywhere lets us do that, as users can develop the bots by themselves.

I have taken one of the finance processes, which is completely Excel driven, and consolidated more than 20 Excel files of large volumes of data by drawing pivot tables and all sorts of yield curves on the Excel files. I converted this structured, formulaic process to the bot. There are features within the Automation Anywhere which let you do types of keystrokes, formatting in Excel sheets, etc. The process used to take more than 30 hours for the user to complete on a quarterly basis. With the development of this bot, the bot can run the entire process within an hour and a half. It saves about more than 20 hours of time for the user. This is just one example. There are other bots saving hundreds of productivity hours per quarter. 

It lets users add value with their time other than focusing on downloading Excel files, consolidating, and drawing up formulas. Since everything is structured, these easily are incorporated into the bot's work.

What is most valuable?

Anybody can develop a bot by themselves. It's not a technical language oriented program. Specific skill sets with language learning skills are not required. Any finance person can get in and develop a bot with a little training on Automation Anywhere. They can go in and develop themselves. 

What needs improvement?

In the version that we have, there are some challenges with the browser-based applications, the cloning of the objects, and the solution's stability. 

Automation Anywhere must be able to maintain a consistent resolution. 

The latest edition, which is enterprise A2019, has better analytics and the cloud all integrated into the bot framework. 

The client version is getting challenging to use because you have to maintain a lot of infrastructure. You must have the machines to deploy the client. However, you don't need a large infrastructure, if you can do it on the cloud. 

I would like a Bot Store for MetaBots. The MetaBot feature needs to be expanded. E.g., I would like a copy/paste from the top row of Excel where I don't need to write a keystroke. Instead, I could just use MetaBot for this.

What do I think about the scalability of the solution?

We have already launched more than 20 bots live into production. They are up and running. We are doing very well with these. We are in a convenient spot for delivering 50 to 60 more bots in the next couple of quarters.

Because it can accommodate 200 to 300 bots, the scale is not a constraint for us. It is scalable.

How are customer service and technical support?

The technical support is good. I have contacted technical support of Automation Anywhere quite a few times during the process of developing a bot. Their responses were good and up to the mark. There were very responsive and proactive in resolving issues. They were on top in terms of supporting the features of the applications.

Which solution did I use previously and why did I switch?

Our finance organization needed to transform itself to meet the changing business models. We established the finance transformation office to meet the entire organization's financing transformation needs. As part of that, we identified a couple of quarters ago that RPA was one of the software solutions which could help us automate several of our business processes. This is apart from the re-engineering and re-architecture that we do to transform our entire business process. Now, there can be some use cases within finance which can be transformed through usage of automation software, like Automation Anywhere.

We have streamlined several activities, cutting down on manual activities. This has happened over the last six to seven years.

How was the initial setup?

I was not part of the setup process.

What was our ROI?

We have established a CoE and we take our bot opportunities based on their ROIs. The best ROI opportunity goes to development first. Our ROI opportunities are compliance, profitable growth, productivity enhancements, productivity gains, number of hours the productivity saved, and resources not available that the work can be done by the bot. However, the single most important criteria that we use to measure ROI is how much time does the bot cut down from an analyst's work, as this has the best ROI. E.g., if an analyst is spending a 100 hours of work that a bot can do in one hour, we calculate the 99 hours saved as ROI.

At the end of the day, finance analysts expect faster outcomes while having their manual work taken away. There should be a more diligent way for them to add value and contributing to the organization through analytics and providing valuable insights. This removal of manual work can be done using a bot. That is the goal.

Which other solutions did I evaluate?

Our enterprise IT team chose Automation Anywhere as our product for doing automation. Automation Anywhere is one of the best, leading automation software tools for developing enterprise automation.

What other advice do I have?

I would recommend Automation Anywhere.

I am excited about the Microsoft partnership that was announced today. Excel is a daily core tool for us. With an automation plugin, this works like a miracle for the finance team. The potential is unlimited, e.g., Office 365 and Internet Explorer will have plugins.

Disclosure: I am a real user, and this review is based on my own experience and opinions.
PeerSpot user
it_user1180137 - PeerSpot reviewer
Senior Analyst at Merck KGaA
Real User
Decreased the workload and tickets on our service desk
Pros and Cons
  • "Just for this use case, we had around 300 tickets coming in every month. We went live last month and the tickets went down to around 80 as of August 20th. While it might touch around 100, over a period of around six months it will become zero because we have not removed all the legacy data. We are just doing it from the go date of when we went live. The target is that it will be zero after three months. So, it's working well."
  • "Automation Anywhere is unable to connect to the database directly. What we are doing now is directly writing the PL/SQL scripts and trying to push the data from the database into Automation Anywhere. This feature is available in UiPath, but not in Automation Anywhere."

What is our primary use case?

We have an ITMS Service Desk that has a lot of tickets coming to it. As an enterprise, there are too many applications there, which are being used by employees. This service desk enables them to address all the issues which they are facing, whether it is on the application, infrastructure, etc. There is a group who manages all these tickets coming through ServiceNow. These numbers are huge. To manage these services or change requests, we use Automation Anywhere when it is not possible to use either an API or do scripting.

My company is using the latest version.

How has it helped my organization?

I have one application that does not publish any APIs. However, there is one activity where every employee needs to be registered in that particular application. Now, we use Automation Anywhere for this. So, we get the data from the source data using the front-end of that application through the Automation Anywhere script. Then, we do registration of the employees into that application. Previously, this was being done by people on our service desk. Now, we are using Automation Anywhere to do this activity. This has saved a lot of time. 

Just for this use case, we had around 300 tickets coming in every month. We went live last month and the tickets went down to around 80 as of August 20th. While it might touch around 100, over a period of around six months it will become zero because we have not removed all the legacy data. We are just doing it from the go date of when we went live. The target is that it will be zero after three months. So, it's working well.

A work in progress is a request which came in from employees using ServiceNow to create a VPN account for them. Today, this is a manual process where the service desk people have to raise a ticket to another team who create the VPN account for the employees. This is why we are currently automating this process.

What is most valuable?

I like that it can login to any system as a robot and do the work that humans can.

What needs improvement?

Automation Anywhere is unable to connect to the database directly. What we are doing now is directly writing the PL/SQL scripts and trying to push the data from the database into Automation Anywhere. This feature is available in UiPath, but not in Automation Anywhere.

I am unaware if Automation Anywhere is able to read unstructured data, build some intelligence around it, and then push it into the application. We do have some requirements in our organization where invoices are scanned, and based on the data, hard copies of the data are fed into some applications. Today, we are using different tools for these features, but if it is available in the tool, then that would be good.

What do I think about the scalability of the solution?

We are a midsize company in the Indian market running one or two bots. 

From a scalability perspective, I don't think there will be any issues. It is pretty good.

How are customer service and technical support?

Support-wise, it is great. 

How was the initial setup?

We installed this on a cloud infrastructure and had a lot of challenges. However, there was a dedicated support person who was helping us to do the installation.

The initial setup was definitely complex. Layman people cannot do it. People with a bit of knowledge need some help from Automation Anywhere.

It took a month and a half to do the basic installation of this software along with some internal processes related to our firewalls.

What about the implementation team?

We had a dedicated person from Automation Anywhere who was supporting us at the time of the initial installation.

What was our ROI?

While our Automation Anywhere's implementation is in a premature stage, it has really decrease the workload on our service desk. We are looking to decrease the ticket counts too. I definitely see this solution helping us in the future.

Our tickets have decreased. We have more than 40 uses cases. We definitely see some ROI in the future from this product.

What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?

In the Indian market, I feel that for mid-size companies, such as ourselves, that having multiple bots costs a lot. If Automation Anywhere wants to expand in the Indian market, they will need to look at their pricing.

Which other solutions did I evaluate?

One of the major reasons that we went for Automation Anywhere was a global MSA, which our company has with Automation Anywhere. They wanted us to use this particular tool for our end customers too. 

I am part of an internal CIO team, where our customers are our employees. However, as an organization, we had a global agreement with Automation Anywhere where they wanted to deliver this tool to the end customer as part of their solutions. Because of that agreement, we went with Automation Anywhere.

My team (who uses both Automation Anywhere and UiPath) says that UiPath has better modules and functionality than Automation Anywhere.

What other advice do I have?

I'm seeing some results in the use case for whatever we are trying to automate. So, it has been really helpful.

Don't use an RPA tool for any problem statement. I've seen people use any RPA tool available for their problem statement just to say that they are using some type of RPA. E.g., We had a use case where we had to read information from an Excel table and generate a report, so people started using Automation Anywhere. However, it would have been better in this scenario to use Power BI by creating scripts.

Disclosure: PeerSpot contacted the reviewer to collect the review and to validate authenticity. The reviewer was referred by the vendor, but the review is not subject to editing or approval by the vendor. The reviewer's company has a business relationship with this vendor other than being a customer: Partner.
PeerSpot user
Director of Business Process Improvement at a pharma/biotech company with 10,001+ employees
Real User
We have established more reliable enterprise business processes which we can run 24/7
Pros and Cons
  • "We valued the ease of use, when we were thinking about scaling out to the business. The recording feature, while not a developer tool - it is a tool for a business user who may not possess the thought process of a developer - we valued that in our evaluation."
  • "On the cognitive side, some of their competitors, when we were originally shopping, were a little more advanced in that space. Making use of probabilistic outcomes and presenting them to a business user is a feature that, at the time of our evaluation, did not feel like a strong, mature solution for Automation Anywhere. Nevertheless, they won our business. That is one feature where I feel they are trying to make investments to address those gaps."

What is our primary use case?

We use it for back-office administrative business processes, within order-to-cash. We have an end-to-end process automation that supports customer billings. We also have task-based automations that process either customer credit memos, or credit and re-bills, working within SAP.

We started with the solution on-prem and we have shifted to an AWS cloud environment.

How has it helped my organization?

It has allowed us to establish more reliable business processes, when transacting in our enterprise systems. It has improved the reliability of our monthly billing processes that, in the past, was dependent on manual, nine-to-five types of activities. We can now schedule those activities, process 24 hours a day, and then we review exceptions. I would emphasize and underscore the reliability aspect and the ability to process 24/7.

It is highly reliable, both from an uptime perspective and regarding data-quality and input into the systems. It's doing the same thing, every time, with 100 percent accuracy.

To put it in terms of hours, we are approaching 10,000-plus hours of capacity on an annual basis.

What is most valuable?

There aren't any features that are specifically valuable. We are not using IQ Bots.

What needs improvement?

On the cognitive side, some of their competitors, when we were originally shopping, were a little more advanced in that space. Making use of probabilistic outcomes and presenting them to a business user is a feature that, at the time of our evaluation, did not feel like a strong, mature solution for Automation Anywhere. Nevertheless, they won our business. That is one feature where I feel they are trying to make investments to address those gaps.

For how long have I used the solution?

We have been using Automation Anywhere ( /products/automation-anywhere-aa-reviews ) since January of 2018, so a little over a year-and-a-half.

What do I think about the stability of the solution?

The platform has been very stable. There have been a few Control Room issues when adding new VMs, but overall it's very reliable. I'm pleased with the performance so far.

What do I think about the scalability of the solution?

We are pleased with Automation Anywhere's ability to scale. We are convinced that it is a platform that we can scale, and we are convinced that it can function and operate within our environment.

We have six-plus use cases in production today. But those business processes are very complex. They are touching many systems. Our definition of a bot is a business process, not a task. Some companies call a bot a task. We don't do that, we call it a business process. We have six business processes that are running, which are very complex in nature. 

Regarding the scalability of a single business process, we have found that to be very easy. We have found Automation Anywhere to be very friendly when it comes to that. We add capacity in the form a virtual machine and a license to scale and meet the needs of the business.

How are customer service and technical support?

We have not dealt directly with Automation Anywhere's tech support. Historically, they've been pretty good. I'm relaying that from my systems integrator and my helpdesk support. I always ask if they are getting what they need when they need it and the answer is yes. I'm pleased with the feedback I'm hearing.

How was the initial setup?

The original setup was easy. What was difficult was adding licenses. I went a month where I was paying for licenses that I couldn't use, for various reasons. That was painful.

I'm not familiar with how long it took to stand up the environments. It was pretty simple from a PoC point of view, with the free trial licenses that were made available to us by AA in conjunction with their preferred systems integrator. That was fairly painless. Standing up the production environment was relatively painless as well. We had no problems whatsoever there. However, as we scale and add licenses, we have challenges.

What was our ROI?

Based on our use cases, we have seen a return on our initial investment for the PoC, and we are continuing to leverage the platform as we scale.

What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?

Price is where I'm least satisfied. Other vendors are more willing to offer discounts.

Which other solutions did I evaluate?

We looked at Blue Prism, UiPath, and WorkFusion. Those were the vendors that were strongly considered when we were evaluating Automation Anywhere's capabilities. There was a laundry-list of others, prior to those, which we evaluated from a market-research point of view.

We valued the market presence of Automation Anywhere. We valued the ease of use, when we were thinking about scaling out to the business. The recording feature, while not a developer tool - it is a tool for a business user who may not possess the thought process of a developer - we valued that in our evaluation. Those were the two major factors. 

And at the time, the commercial terms as well, the one-year commitment, was appealing to us when we were shopping the solution. We didn't want to sign a multi-year deal on a technology platform that wasn't proven out to our business. That was another factor which gave us comfort as part of the decision-making process.

What other advice do I have?

At the start, I advise picking a portfolio of use cases to start with. Some will over-perform and others will not. Think of it in terms of a portfolio approach to sell the concept to your organization. My second area of advice would be: Do not automate systems that you do not own or control, unless you are willing to accept the degree of maintenance associated with that automation.

The biggest lesson I've learned so far from using it is that it's not as easy as the salespeople say. The biggest challenge is that not all automations are created equal. To give you some context, there are automations that I still don't have in production which have taken me over half-a-year to build. You talk to a sales guy and he says, "Hey, you can build an automation and be up in two weeks." Yes, but will that automation add a drop of value to the business? Probably not. The challenges are around stabilizing our complex automations.

Anything Google-related is challenging. I didn't really receive any help from our systems integrator or from AA when it came to the Google platform. We paid, extensively, to learn the hard way.

As part of our CoE, we rely on a third-party for development and maintenance of our automations. That means we have no users of the solution in our organization. The third-party has access to Bot Creators, they have access to our development environment and Control Room. They promote code to production and maintain the automations.

We have plans to increase our usage of the solution in the future. It is our intention to build an internal capability, over time. The processes we are looking to automate are more within order-cash and back-office. We have some administrative, travel, maintenance. Our IT ticketing system spawns maintenance; there's also account-creation and maintenance. That's an area of focus for us. And we're exploring reporting capabilities which are on the simple side. That's the area where we're targeting internal development and building an internal competency. It's what we characterize as simple automation use cases.

Overall, Automation anywhere is pretty good. It's not perfect but it's up there. I don't have a point of reference, other examples, but I think it's pretty good at what it does.

Disclosure: PeerSpot contacted the reviewer to collect the review and to validate authenticity. The reviewer was referred by the vendor, but the review is not subject to editing or approval by the vendor.
PeerSpot user
Technical Architect at a consumer goods company with 10,001+ employees
Real User
The automation tool is user-friendly and has an easy deployment process
Pros and Cons
  • "I utilize all the commands provided by Automation Anywhere, such as all the recorders. I use these commands to develop my processes and bots."
  • "With the PDF command, you can only read structured data. If your data is in an unstructured format, there is no command for it in Automation Anywhere. Then, people need to use Python coding if their data is in unstructured format. Therefore, Automation Anywhere needs to improve in the PDF area."

What is our primary use case?

The tool is used to automate any business process. Some examples are:

  • If you want to download some data from a website or push some data onto a website.
  • If you work with an Excel application and want to automate it, or any Windows-based application, you can automate it as long as you know what the business process is.
  • If a person is doing a day-to-day activity and you want to automate that activity, you can use the Automation Anywhere tool to do it.

I have worked with the Windows, Excel, and web applications, along with some SAP automation and how to automate that SAP data. I use Automation Anywhere to determine automation for how to:

  • Distribute the process. 
  • Schedule the process. 
  • Run the process. 
  • Design the process.
  • Distribute the data for 1000 to 10,000 data points (in Excel).

How has it helped my organization?

I have automated the invoicing in a finance department, where the finance department wanted to automate the invoicing process. They wanted to do the following:

  • Invoice the data.
  • Create the invoice.
  • Mail the invoice.
  • Download the invoice data.

If you have 10 operators currently performing these activities everyday, then you automate the process, by removing the 10 operators and having only one operator required, this will decrease costs. It will also increase the efficiency of your company.

In the automatic invoicing system, we created a file which pushes onto a shared folder. The bot will pick up the file automatically from the shared folder and process the invoice. Therefore, if tomorrow, another bot were to be created, we could just create a file and copy it to the shared folder, then it would pick up the file and process the invoice.

What is most valuable?

I utilize all the commands provided by Automation Anywhere, such as all the recorders. I use these commands to develop my processes and bots.

Automation Anywhere has a drag and drop process.

What needs improvement?

Automation Anywhere needs to improve Excel and its commands. In Excel, if you want to add a sheet, you cannot add a sheet. There is no command for adding a sheet. Also, if you want to rename something in Excel, you cannot rename it. You always must keep a list that you can rename through your keyboard, but there is no specific command in Automation Anywhere. 

The email automation command also needs to be improved. The email automation command sometimes is not working properly. When you connect the mail server, it is not being done properly.

The OCR feature is not that reliable.

With the PDF command, you can only read structured data. If your data is in an unstructured format, there is no command for it in Automation Anywhere. Then, people need to use Python coding if their data is in unstructured format. Therefore, Automation Anywhere needs to improve in the PDF area.

For how long have I used the solution?

I have been using the product for the last two years.

What do I think about the stability of the solution?

I didn't have any stability issues. 

What do I think about the scalability of the solution?

I haven't found any scalability issues with it. If the volume increases tomorrow, another bot can be added from the Control Room.

I worked with a single deployment model, which didn't have a load balancer requirement. Higher availability deployments require load balancers.

How are customer service and technical support?

I haven't dealt with Automation Anywhere's technical support.

How was the initial setup?

For the implementation, you just follow the proper process on how to deploy the proper hardware configuration on the production environment. The process does not take that much time as you push files to the Control Room, then from the Control Room, you can download the client. It does depend on how many bots you are implementing and how you are scheduling them.

Automation Anywhere is deployed from a deployment guideline in a step-by-step process. Automation Anywhere provides some deployment guidelines, which can be referred to.

What about the implementation team?

Only one person is required for deployment: the Control Room administrator.

The number of people required for monitoring the solution depends on the amount of bots deployed.

What was our ROI?

It saves time and money. If a bot does the same work as nine out of 10 people, then you are saving money through wages. Also, a bot will work all hours without interruption, whereas FTEs may need time off or vacation. 

What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?

I believe it is $10,000 for Bot Creator. 

Which other solutions did I evaluate?

The Automation Anywhere automation tool is user-friendly, especially compared to UiPath and Blue Prism. Automation Anywhere's deployment is also easy compared to other RPA tools.

What other advice do I have?

The solution is good for people who want to do their job quickly without any delay or problems. 

The future of IT will require every organization to need automation.

The Control Room is good in version 11, as compared to the previous versions of the Control Room.

Disclosure: I am a real user, and this review is based on my own experience and opinions.
PeerSpot user
Automation Leader at Hexaware Technologies Limited
Video Review
Real User
We have found with many customers that it's quite easy to deploy
Pros and Cons
  • "Its ease of deployment is the most valuable feature. We have found with many customers that it's quite easy to deploy."
  • "Room for improvement is more on the IQ Bot side: How quickly we can adopt and deploy it?"

What is our primary use case?

We are an IT services firm. We use it for simple processes, but also for complex. We usually take up simple processes for manual tasks, which are easy to automate.

We have mostly done financial services: finance and accounting processes. That has been for the most part. We have also used it in HR and recruitment to find resumes online, and in other processes.

What is most valuable?

Its ease of deployment is the most valuable feature. We have found with many customers that it's quite easy to deploy. The other valuable feature, which is not from a technology perspective, is how Automation Anywhere collaborates with us. So, it has made our journey much easier than with other partners that we have.

What needs improvement?

Room for improvement is more on the IQ Bot side: How quickly we can adopt and deploy it? 

Another area which I feel would help is how the business can adopt it:

  • Is it easier for the business to make changes to the tool once it's deployed? 
  • How can the business take up roles in the man-machine continuum? 
  • How can the business and machine work together, and how does the role change for the business stakeholder. 

It's more on the change management side, but includes all of the tool enabler.

What do I think about the stability of the solution?

It has been quite good in terms of making changes. As we are working on the process, it's much easier to make changes.

What do I think about the scalability of the solution?

In terms of scaling up, we have not had issues with bots which are in production. In UAT, there have been scaling issues. But in production, as long as a solution is good, then it works.

Which solution did I use previously and why did I switch?

It was a strategy from our company. We were looking to reduce the cost of operations for our existing clients. We were looking at different ways in which we could reduce our business, in a way, by reducing costs and get more business from the same clients. So this is where we started, by looking at automation as a major thing for Hexaware itself. It starts from our visions, which aligns very well with what Automation Anywhere provides, as a platform. That is where we started, then we have obviously grown and been able to automate many processes, which helped us to get many deals where we are upfront and able to tell clients how much optimization is possible. This is sort of my role, to showcase to the clients how much automation is feasible, in a particular process. We are quite good at that and have been able to do multiple engagements in this space.

What was our ROI?

We have automated one process, which was running with 109 people. We reduced it down to 69 with automation.

Which other solutions did I evaluate?

We looked at Blue Prism, UiPath, Automation Anywhere, and World Fusion, and we struggled. Initially, we worked with other firms, but we have seen a great synergy with how Automation Anywhere integrates with our team and how we are getting support from Automation Anywhere. When we are going to a client with Automation Anywhere, it's much easier. That collaboration with their support team, and their advice to us, is extremely good. That's why we end up referring Automation Anywhere.

What other advice do I have?

I would like to use IQ Bot a little bit more and understand more about what is offered, as to what features are there. One of the key challenges that we have had, in implementation, is for complex processes, especially where the input is not standardized. So, IQ Bot seems to be a good tool to use there. Hopefully, it will address everything, but mostly on that.

I would rate the product around eight to eight and a half. Mainly, because there is always room for improvement, and we're happy with the tool. There are areas which we need to understand more, as well, like IQ Bot for instance. We did one engagement with IQ Bot, but we need to mature ourselves into how we can utilize it. As the product matures, I'm sure it will be easier for us.

My advice will be to get a partner who is wiling to work with you and is willing to collaborate. This will make your life easier in the automation journey. There will be initial hiccups when you are getting into this journey, and that's just part of any journey. You need to look internally as to how you can improve, and work with a strong team, to deploy the solution.

Disclosure: My company has a business relationship with this vendor other than being a customer: Partner.
PeerSpot user
Buyer's Guide
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Updated: October 2024
Buyer's Guide
Download our free Automation Anywhere Report and get advice and tips from experienced pros sharing their opinions.