Understand the technical principles, product form, design and construction of RPA in one article
In the past year, the RPA robotic process automation industry has ushered in a rapid development opportunity. RPA entrepreneurs have been recognized by domestic investors, and some RPA companies have successively received tens of millions of dollars in financing, which is particularly dazzling in the current cold capital market environment.
Right now, RPA has taken root in industries such as finance, accounting, telecommunications, energy, manufacturing, and logistics. The current RPA technology can replace all tasks that require manual repetitive operations in the internal software of various industries and enterprises.
RPA technical principle and product form
At present, most of the RPA tools are developed based on the Workflow Foundation of Microsoft's .NET Framework, integrating OCR, NLP and other AI technologies, and can be executed across systems with weak coupling, that is, without changing the existing software system deployment, and achieve zero errors rate. Technically, RPA is no longer a customized function of a single enterprise. In fact, it has grown into a service that integrates AI technology, system-level cross-software and hardware, and multiple accounts.
There are three RPA product forms in the current market:
1. Enterprise customized independent RPA software, open the computer and click to use;
2. Platform RPA products used in accounting, financial and other industry scenarios, the client includes a graphical designer, execution environment (robot), and cloud console It is the basic AI service and settlement system;
3. The RPA platform that supports the developer's secondary development, provides all the functions of the second type, and also provides the corresponding development interface for customization.
The first product form has existed in the domestic and foreign markets for nearly 20 years. It is a basic tool commonly used by some labor outsourcing companies. It has been used in industries such as finance, accounting, telecom operators, and call centers. It belongs to customized RPA services. This kind of RPA is more sophisticated, stable in service, low in price, and flexible in cooperation. It is suitable for small and medium-sized enterprises, large group branches and outsourcing companies.
The latter two have better versatility in vertical industries, high product flexibility, and real-time upgrade of the company's internal business processes, suitable for deployment by large groups, and high product technical requirements. But the disadvantage is that if the product technology does not meet the standard, it is easy to become a SI technical service provider.
RPA companies are also learning the SaaS and PaaS models, deploying part of their functions in the cloud, and charging on time by renting out robot labor-trying to approach the subscription system in the delivery model. At present, the most representative domestic RPA+AI SaaS platform is UiBot Store, which is currently the largest RPA+AI SaaS platform in China.
In the future, can RPA companies find a path to the cloud with more advantages than integrated automation, or directly form a strong position in integrated automation, so as to lead the development of enterprise service software and directly incorporate integrated automation into the concept of RPA?
Explain the design and construction of RPA in detail
Deloitte mentioned in a research report on RPA that a Fortune 1000 company with a revenue of US$20 billion and 50,000 employees, if 20% of its work can be automated with RPA, it will bring the company to Come over 30 million dollars in profit. The implementation of RPA has become a new trend. So, how should companies deploy a set of RPA robots?
The design and construction of the RPA robot mainly includes three major steps: First, determine the detailed logic of the process. Second, determine the new business process based on the RPA model. Finally determine the robot software configuration and development workload.
1. Determine the logic of the process details
RPA is a technology that automates manual activities by performing a large number of repetitive and rule-based tasks on a computer. Therefore, before determining the detailed logic of the process, you should first clarify the basic functions of RPA and determine how to use RPA to replace each step in the existing business process.
The basic functions of RPA currently on the market usually include data retrieval and recording, image recognition and processing, platform upload and download, data processing and analysis, information monitoring and output, etc. Based on the applicable scenarios of RPA, to optimize and reengineer the existing business process, it is necessary to determine the detailed logic of replacing each step of the business process with RPA.
2. Determine the new business process based on the RPA model
After the enterprise has determined the RPA replacement logic for each link of the business process, it needs to connect the business links to establish a new business process based on the RPA model. The RPA business process does not need to be completely consistent with the manual business process links. On the basis of ensuring the complete process, the advantages of RPA can be considered to merge or split the links.
Three, determine the RPA robot software configuration and development workload
1. Software configuration. After determining the new business process based on the RPA model, it is necessary to configure the corresponding software for the IT systems or applications in each link in the new process and determine the software development workload.
Not every link in the new process requires a corresponding software system. Under normal circumstances, multiple links can be completed on the same IT system or Internet platform. The enterprise needs to determine the software configuration required for the RPA process and the amount of software development work. This work generally needs to refer to the opinions of IT experts, based on which it is determined that the enterprise IT department will cooperate with other business departments to complete the new process development work, or seek the support of third-party suppliers.
2. Staffing. The implementation of RPA requires the coordination of business personnel, IT departments and suppliers. Generally required personnel include: infrastructure team, application development experts or supervisors, technical business analysts, business analysts, IT automation managers, application compliance experts, and project managers. Realizing the optimization of key personnel in the RPA implementation process is conducive to the smooth realization of RPA deployment. In fact, this process can also be achieved by building a cross-functional department. This department is the RPA Center of Excellence (COE).
COE is usually created when an enterprise launches RPA early, and is mainly used to support the implementation and ongoing deployment of RPA. This team uses RPA tools and technical experience to identify and manage ongoing RPA implementations.