Hilal Paray. - PeerSpot reviewer
Global Head of Automation & Digitalization /Digital Transformation Advisor /Technical Lead / Customer Success at Omnyx International
Reseller
Easy to learn, integrates well, and offers fair pricing
Pros and Cons
  • "The solution has helped us increase productivity."
  • "There is a dependency issue around the control room. If the control room is not working, the bots will not work."

What is our primary use case?

Automation Anywhere is an RPA tool. The use case is the same for all automation tools. In my most recent project, I've used it for three-way invoice matching and sending it to the accounts for verifications. The process was a mixture of IQ bot, which is an OCR from Automation Anywhere, and then other RPA bots. 

I've used it in health care, where people apply for insurance applications to the insurance companies. 

I have implemented more than five hundred use cases as of now.

How has it helped my organization?

It's helped manage repetitive processes. If there's a repetitive process, that is our best use case, and we can pitch to the customer that we can make it shorter. Then we save them man hours and increase their efficiency and accuracy. 

For example, mostly in finance, when companies are preparing the salaries and have to prepare 1,500 payments for employees, sometimes they make mistakes, and they have to spend time on that. 

We can instead provide a fixed format for the robot that they have to follow every month, and it saves a lot of time, a lot of man hours. One of our customers here in the Middle East has saved around 10,000 man-hours for a telecom company with the help of 50 to 60 robots initially, and now the same company is using around 4,000 robots now. 

What is most valuable?

It helps save time on manual tasks. Compared to manual input, the results are much better, faster, and more accurate. For example, we have clients that can now easily process 10,000 invoices in one day. They have around 55 employees for that. We can augment the workload with a root, and if an employee wants to take a holiday or needs sick leave, other employees don't have to pick up the slack. Robots can input information into the system. 

The era of automation has changed. It's time for hyper-automation now. RPA is moving from just handling repetitive tasks to allowing for AI and offering automation plus conversational AI. It will help me. Soon I will be able to use it in WhatsApp, and all of the information can be entered, and you can initiate appointments, et cetera. RPA plus conversational AI plus AI-enabled OCR systems will be the future. 

There are a lot of great features, especially the IQ bot. It has very good accuracy on invoices. Previously, we were dependent on different software, and now, we can build in Automation Anywhere only.

It's easy to use for non-technical people. It's not rocket science. A business user might take a few weeks or a month to learn it, and then they will be quite capable of doing things themselves. A technical person may learn it in 15 days. Everything needs time; however, the learning curve is not so bad. A lot of things are available to help with learning. If someone spends one or two hours a day, they will pick it up. You can Google information or watch YouTube videos. There are hundreds of demos, materials, and more free of cost.

We do use CoPilot. We try to build a center of excellence with all customers, and we're giving them training around any bottlenecks they have.

The solution has helped us increase productivity. How much of an increase differs from customer to customer. Usually, it improves by 20% to 30%.

There's lots of integration possible. We've integrated with business tools like Oracle, SAP, and Salesforce. We can integrate easily into various workflows and APIs. We can access APIs with just a few clicks. We can also build out a UI-based integration.

It's helped us save time. Every customer saves a different amount of time, percentage-wise. Some can save hundreds of hours.  I've had a client save 30% of their time over the past few years thanks to automation. 

What needs improvement?

There is a dependency issue around the control room. If the control room is not working, the bots will not work. When that happens, we have to wait for the control room to go back up. Other tools in the market do not have this issue. If something is down, it means everything is down.

Buyer's Guide
Automation Anywhere (AA)
April 2024
Learn what your peers think about Automation Anywhere (AA). Get advice and tips from experienced pros sharing their opinions. Updated: April 2024.
768,415 professionals have used our research since 2012.

For how long have I used the solution?

I've been using the solution for three years now. However, I've worked with automation in general for six years. 

What do I think about the stability of the solution?

The solution is stable. It's good software. It works well. 

What do I think about the scalability of the solution?

The product scales well. 

How are customer service and support?

Technical support is good; however, sometimes it takes a while to solve problems.

How would you rate customer service and support?

Positive

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

I previously was using UiPath. It's quite easy to use. They are both very similar solutions. 

How was the initial setup?

I was mostly involved in the infrastructure, so I was not directly involved in the deployment. My understanding is that it is not difficult. However, when we upgraded it, we had challenges. 

There is some maintenance required. Normally, it works fine. Sometimes, there may be migrations or updates required. Only one or two people need to handle maintenance. We don't maintain bots. However, we just deploy them. Maintenance can be completed by the customer, and it might take five to six hours or one day at a maximum. 

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

Compared to Microsoft, the solution is expensive. However, compared to UiPath, it's fairly low - maybe 25% less. Generally, within the market, the price is average. It's competitive.

What other advice do I have?

I'd rate the solution eight out of ten. 

We're a reseller. 

Which deployment model are you using for this solution?

Public Cloud
Disclosure: My company has a business relationship with this vendor other than being a customer: Reseller
Flag as inappropriate
PeerSpot user
Executive Director, Business Analytics & Optimization & RPA Head at a hospitality company with 5,001-10,000 employees
Real User
Provides a lot of ways to automate processes and integrates well with our applications
Pros and Cons
  • "The whole suite of RPA modules that they have is very good. They have three environments in which you can do your automation. You have development, staging, and production environments. These are run by licenses as well, which is very good. There are a lot of ways of automating processes with this application."
  • "Their license model needs to be improved. The biggest issue for me is that the license is tied to a person, and it is not something that I can pass if I want to use it for the first five hours and pass it on to you for the next five hours and so on. When we automate, the license is tied to me, and if you or somebody else needs to use that license, as a COE administrator, I need to transfer the license from person A to person B. This is something that I have always told them that should not be this way because you want to utilize your licenses effectively."

What is our primary use case?

I am working with an integrated resort. It is a hotel with a casino in Singapore. There are about 130 manual processes that we have automated touching the front office, call center, back of the house, finance, facilities, and casino areas as well. We have automated scheduling and workforce planning. 

My business is divided into what we call gaming and non-gaming space. It is an integrated resort. We started out by automating use cases from the non-gaming area. In the third year, we started venturing out a little bit into the gaming area. We did not go into the heavy gaming areas such as on the casino floor. We went for support processes at the back of the house, which included scheduling and things like that. We are also doing reporting. 

Most of what we have is for attended and unattended bots. We have just started to use Co-Pilot or what used to be known as AARI. It is something new for us, and we have only one process using that. It is a pilot project. It is something new that we started now in our fifth year.

How has it helped my organization?

Automation Anywhere has helped our organization increase its automation consumption. It has helped the business address some of the pain points. It has helped the business understand that there are other ways of doing things and getting out of the manual processing. We come from a heavily people-oriented industry. We are into hospitality where you need the human touch for our business. We are not a bank. We are not a financial institution. The mindset change that I have seen with my business stakeholders because of the automations that we are doing for them is a plus. It is a game changer. In our first year of doing this, we started out very small. I had a team of myself and one developer, and now, in our fifth year, we have over 130 bots touching over 40 business units. I now have a team of four people, so we have grown. We now have a culture or ecosystem where the business stakeholders know that if they are still doing something heavily manual and highly repetitive, and it is not adding any real value to the time of the team member, there is a team within the organization that they can approach. This team will help with whatever pain point they have or take that task out of their day-to-day work so that they can concentrate on higher-value activities. This whole mindset or this whole culture or ecosystem is now there in the company. Automation Anywhere has helped elevate the consciousness of the organization by realizing that there is an automation world out there, and we can bring solutions to the table for their problems and use cases.

When it comes to integration, we have been lucky so far. We use many applications. The processes that we have automated touch 30 to 40 applications that we have in-house. It is seamless. It is fine, but some of the third-party applications that we are trying to integrate with are not necessarily very automation-friendly. The objects of those third-party applications are always changing, and therefore, we constantly have to rescript, but that is not necessarily Automation Anywhere's problem. That is just the nature of the other third-party applications that may not necessarily want you to be automating or layering on top of their systems and get behind their applications. I have been lucky so far. We have not had to go back to a business and say that we cannot automate their process because Automation Anywhere cannot integrate with a particular application. I have not had that experience as of now.

The learning curve of Automation Anywhere for my own team was pretty good. If you are a full-on developer, it is one of the easier tools to learn in the market. It is pretty good as long as this is something that you are using regularly. If you are a dedicated person doing the development and working with the tool, it is very easy to use. As far as my developers are concerned, it is very easy. We are able to turn around projects or use cases in three to four weeks. For even complex ones, there is a fairly good turnaround time in terms of delivering to our stakeholders. We do not train nontechnical people on its use. Businesses only receive automation from us, so they are not trained on it. If they are going to be trained on it, it is only on how to run their bots, and that is a part of our production development checklist or lifecycle that we give them. It just takes a day or two because we only teach them how to run their bots. It is delivered to them. We do all the installation on their machines. We set up their machines, and then we teach them how to run the bots.

When we first engaged with them, we thought that we could easily go into what we refer to as a citizen developer type of framework, but that did not go too well. We rely heavily on the CoE team, which is my team, to do automation. We have a build and support model for our business users. Business users are only taught how to run their bots. We do not teach our business users how to build a bot. We tried that and did some training with some key business stakeholders. It was a three-day training, but it did not prove to be too successful. After the training, they go back to their business units, and if it is not the core or what they do on a day-to-day basis, it is very hard to sustain, so the main building and the heavy lifting came back to the CoE team. Our team delivers to business units. From that perspective, I would rate Automation Anywhere a three out of five. Business users cannot just go ahead and build their own bots without really learning and understanding the tool.

What is most valuable?

The whole suite of RPA modules that they have is very good. They have three environments in which you can do your automation. You have development, staging, and production environments. These are run by licenses as well, which is very good. There are a lot of ways of automating processes with this application. I am not a developer. I run the RPA CoE team. I have a team that does the actual development, so I cannot speak of features per se, but the whole RPA module that they have is one of the best in class.

It is easy to use. When you need to make changes to your automation, it is quite quick. You do not need to go through the whole script. You can do it in modules or subtasks.

What needs improvement?

There are several things. They can improve their billing. I have had issues with their billing.

Their license model needs to be improved. The biggest issue for me is that the license is tied to a person, and it is not something that I can pass if I want to use it for the first five hours and pass it on to you for the next five hours and so on. When we automate, the license is tied to me, and if you or somebody else needs to use that license, as a COE administrator, I need to transfer the license from person A to person B. This is something that I have always told them that should not be this way because you want to utilize your licenses effectively. You want to ensure that your utilization of licenses is maximized throughout the organization because you are paying on a per-license basis. If it is tied to a person or to an AD account, how can you pass on that license to others to use if they are from other departments? If there is one big thing that they could change in terms of the subscription model for a license, it would be that it should be concurrent and not tied to a user.

In terms of the product, they can improve the upgrades. They are in A360, which is the cloud version. They went from version 11 to A360, and there are new updates and features all the time. Sometimes, these upgrades break other things that were working previously. We have found out that there are some bugs that are going on with the updates. Because they are on the cloud now, they do every quarter some kind of upgrade or patch.

For how long have I used the solution?

I have been using Automation Anywhere for the past five years. We started out in 2018. I was scouting around the market for an RPA vendor. I am based in Singapore, and after doing a study of top vendors at that time, I decided to go with Automation Anywhere. We are now in our fifth year of engagement with them.

What do I think about the scalability of the solution?

Automation Anywhere is very good at providing automation at scale. We have about 130 bots. They absolutely have the ability to scale for me. Their platform is geared towards that. It is all license-driven, and it is quite easy to scale using this tool. The infrastructure is dependent on us as a company, and making sure that our environment is ready for all the builds that we need to do, the development that we need to do, and the rollouts that we need to do, so there is a handshake between the company and the tool. It is not very complicated once you get the rhythm and once you get your governance going. It is quite good.

How are customer service and support?

I contacted their technical support when some of the functionality broke because of an upgrade or the functionality did not seem correct. In some of those cases, as a client, we were the ones who told them about an issue or a bug in a particular feature. We appreciate that they came back and said that it is correct, they are aware of it, and it is going to be fixed in the next release. We have had a couple of those kinds of instances.

I would rate their support a seven out of ten because we had issues with them in terms of response and in terms of trying to get to the root cause of a problem. We had just migrated to A360. We were on version 11, and we had to switch over because it was going to be end-of-life or end-of-support. They were pushing all their clients to move to A360. In the beginning, my team had to tell their team that these are some of the issues that their A360 tool has and these are some of the bugs. They were a bit slow to react and get to a resolution or root cause.

Also, in the beginning, we were communicating with so many people. There was no continuity in terms of the person handling the ticket. They might have been changing shifts, but when you leave clients to repeat themselves to a new set of people they are talking to overseas, it gets a little bit annoying. I did highlight this point to their management team, and ever since I did that, their support team started handling the account a little bit better, but that is the reason why I am giving them a seven out of ten.

How would you rate customer service and support?

Neutral

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

We were not using any other solution previously. It was our first foray into robotic space. We have been with Automation Anywhere ever since.

How was the initial setup?

Our setup is hybrid. Our control rooms are on the cloud. We are on A360, so our control rooms are on the cloud, but our bots runners are on-premises.

I was involved in its deployment. When we did this at the initial stage in 2018, it was pretty straightforward. They provided great support. We started out by doing eight processes as a pilot. 

Their team provided the developers because I had no developers on my end at that time. Their team did it remotely. They were probably doing it from India. They gave us the requirements. They educated us on what was needed and how we needed to set it up so that they could connect to whatever systems they needed for the eight processes or use cases that I had chosen. They did deliver all those processes within two weeks, so it was pretty straightforward.

Their professional services team was top-grade. They knew what they were talking about, and the people that they gave me in Singapore at that time were very good.

In terms of maintenance, it does not require any maintenance from my end. They do a quarterly patch of it. They announce that they are doing a patch, and it gets done. There is no maintenance on my end for the tool. What I need to maintain are the bots that we have built for the business. That is where the maintenance is, but that is more on our end. That is mostly because the bots break because of the change in third-party applications. 

What about the implementation team?

They had about two or three developers doing the work remotely. There was a salesperson who was based in Singapore, and then they had sent two people from India to come over to Singapore to handle the account in terms of education. We had a program manager as well as a solution architect.

Which other solutions did I evaluate?

Five years ago, we looked at UiPath, Blue Prism, Automation Anywhere, and WorkFusion. We did the scoping in terms of SWOT analysis, and we found Automation Anywhere to be a better partner to work with and a more stable one in 2018. 

What other advice do I have?

To those evaluating Automation Anywhere, I would say that make sure they give you somebody who really knows the tool and they explain the RDLC and the delivery method to you clearly in terms of what you need to set up within your company before you engage. You need to ask the questions because it sounds simple, but it is not that simple, so you need to ask what are the things that you need to have in place in your own organization so that it is a successful rollout.

I was sold on the idea that it is an easy tool to use. Anybody can do it. They do not need to be full-stack developers. Our regular team members can pick it up, but as I got into it, I realized that is not true. Not everybody can do this. You need to have a developer mindset. You need to know how to code. It is not something that anyone can do. That was one thing that I had to learn the hard way. I realized that this model is not going to work for my company, so you need to ask questions. Understand the tool, and make them do a deeper demo in terms of how to build a bot or a complicated process. Do not go with a simple and easy process. If it is of medium complexity, find out how a regular person would do that. Ask them, for instance, what would you need to get this going. Understand the tool and spend more time with the tool before committing.

To someone who wants to use an API integration instead of a robotic process automation (RPA) solution, I would say that if you are doing it through API calls, it is a better way to go. It is more stable because you are doing it from the backend. You are getting connections there rather than using RPA from a front-end perspective.

Overall, I would rate Automation Anywhere an eight out of ten.

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.
Flag as inappropriate
PeerSpot user
Buyer's Guide
Automation Anywhere (AA)
April 2024
Learn what your peers think about Automation Anywhere (AA). Get advice and tips from experienced pros sharing their opinions. Updated: April 2024.
768,415 professionals have used our research since 2012.
Oracle DBA at a financial services firm with 5,001-10,000 employees
Real User
Tech support quickly resolves issues by getting to the exact root cause
Pros and Cons
  • "Business users utilize Bot Insight dashboards to get analysis."
  • "I would like them to add OCR features. This would help us deal with unstructured data and we can get more data out of images."

What is our primary use case?

We are in the retirement industry. We use it for application-based automation. We are trying to mimic our operations to redundant business users' tasks, like clearing claims and loans.

We are using version 10.7. We are currently trying to upgrade to version 11.3.

What is most valuable?

We use Bot Insights. Business users utilize Bot Insight dashboards to get analysis.

What needs improvement?

In the 10.7 version, the back-end port for the MetaBot password has looping. This has been a type of limitation. Now, we are upgrading and integrating the Control Room, which is a validating feature.

I would like them to add OCR features. This would help us deal with unstructured data and we can get more data out of images.

I would like to see more features related to artificial intelligence. 

For how long have I used the solution?

We have had it one year.

What do I think about the stability of the solution?

The latest version is more stable. We have mostly legacy applications. We do interact with Automation Anywhere support for patches and DLLs which are compatible with our legacy applications. Maybe after our upgrade, we can expect more stability.

In couple of months, we are looking to upgrade. We have set up our environment for integrating in AWS into our architecture. We are setting this up now and planning to install Automation Anywhere 11.3 to see how it is.

What do I think about the scalability of the solution?

It is scalable. Since we have only had it one year, we are still looking into the scalabilty factor.

How are customer service and technical support?

The technical support is good. They are knowledgeable and don't waste much of our time. They are quick in resolving things by identifying the exact root cause. 

We try to resolve the issue from our side first because we are trained in the product. It is only when we can't solve the issue that we contact support.

How was the initial setup?

The initial setup is straightforward, except when setting up with cloud-based services, like Amazon. The cloud-based setup process is complex.

What about the implementation team?

Automation Anywhere came in and helped set up the tool for us since it was initially new when we onboarded it.

What was our ROI?

It has saved us a lot of hours, manual effort, and we can focus on more important tasks, which helps us with our ROI.

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

We purchase on a bot basis. Our costs are approximately $5,000.

Which other solutions did I evaluate?

There are a lot of vendors out there, like Blue Prism and UiPath. However, A2019 offers cross platform and single point, which is why I would recommend Automation Anywhere.

What other advice do I have?

I have been very impressed with the A2019 version. This version is phenomenal. 

Disclosure: I am a real user, and this review is based on my own experience and opinions.
PeerSpot user
Mahmoud Bani-Hani - PeerSpot reviewer
RPA Solutions Manager at CGC
Reseller
Top 10
Integrates well and saves time and money
Pros and Cons
  • "The ability to automate renewals of government licenses four times a year is valuable."
  • "The marketing for Automation Anywhere has room for improvement."

What is our primary use case?

We sell Automation Anywhere to customers who want to automate their processes within the hospitality industry.

Our customers can deploy Automation Anywhere both on-premises and in the cloud.

How has it helped my organization?

It is easy to learn and use Automation Anywhere.

Learning to automate using the solution for simple processes in HR and IT is easy. For areas such as finance, the training takes a few months and requires a technical person to train the team.

Integrating with co-pilot is straightforward when using SAP, Oracle, Microsoft, or other international systems. However, challenges arise when integrating with in-house systems.

Co-pilot helps increase productivity for our customers.

We often integrate SAP, Oracle, and Microsoft with Automation Anywhere. There are no issues with the integrations as long as we configure everything properly.

Automation Anywhere enables our customers to achieve savings of over 60 percent in time and money. While employees may take breaks and vacations, their automated processes continue to operate seamlessly without interruption, ensuring a consistent flow of work.

What is most valuable?

The ability to automate renewals of government licenses four times a year is valuable.

What needs improvement?

The marketing for Automation Anywhere has room for improvement.

For how long have I used the solution?

I have been using Automation Anywhere for three years.

What do I think about the scalability of the solution?

Automation Anywhere can provide automation to scale as long as the organization has the budget for it.

How are customer service and support?

The technical support is great.

How would you rate customer service and support?

Positive

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

I use both UiPath and Automation Anywhere. UiPath has a more aggressive marketing strategy and a larger market share. However, our banking, insurance, and high-level customers prefer Automation Anywhere over UiPath.

How was the initial setup?

The deployment time depends on the number of processes being automated.

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

Despite being less expensive than UiPath, Automation Anywhere remains cost-prohibitive for many small and medium-sized businesses.

What other advice do I have?

I would rate Automation Anywhere nine out of ten.

Our customers are all enterprise-level. 

Automation Anywhere does not require ongoing maintenance and offers 24/7 support if any issue arises.

Which deployment model are you using for this solution?

On-premises
Disclosure: My company has a business relationship with this vendor other than being a customer: reseller
Flag as inappropriate
PeerSpot user
Nayeem Mohammed - PeerSpot reviewer
Account and Delivery Head at Jade Global
MSP
Top 10
Has a favorable learning curve, delivers automation at scale, and helps increase automation consumption
Pros and Cons
  • "IQ Bot is the most valuable integrated feature of Automation Anywhere."
  • "It is not easy to integrate APIs with Automation Anywhere without a good knowledge of APIs."

What is our primary use case?

We use Automation Anywhere in the finance domain for tasks such as data reconciliation, data identification, and aviation operations.

How has it helped my organization?

We implemented Automation Anywhere to address our outstanding invoices, purchase orders, and quotations from multiple vendors. We utilized the IQ Bot feature, which is integrated into the OCR system.

For technical individuals, Automation Anywhere is easy to use.

The learning curve is favorable for non-technical staff, as it typically takes between two to four weeks before they can start automating with Automation Anywhere.

Automation Anywhere's capability to deliver automation at scale is commendable. We possess the ability to scale up to multiple users across organizations. In fact, I have successfully executed this RPA using a report containing one Lakh operations, which is equivalent to one hundred thousand.

Automation Anywhere has helped our organization increase its automation consumption. We were able to showcase the use cases and case studies we have completed to market our abilities and services.

What is most valuable?

IQ Bot is the most valuable integrated feature of Automation Anywhere.

What needs improvement?

For business users, the solution is complex and could be made more user-friendly.

It is not easy to integrate APIs with Automation Anywhere without a good knowledge of APIs.

The pricing of Automation Anywhere is higher compared to other solutions on the market, such as Microsoft Power Automate and UiPath, and it has room for improvement.

For how long have I used the solution?

I have been using Automation Anywhere for five years.

What do I think about the stability of the solution?

Automation Anywhere is stable. We can rely on it without encountering any issues.

What do I think about the scalability of the solution?

Automation Anywhere is highly scalable.

How are customer service and support?

The quality of technical support relies on the partnership we maintain with Automation Anywhere. Gold partners receive excellent service. As long as we maintain this relationship with Automation Anywhere, we can expect consistently good service. However, if the partnership is not in place, it may take some time, but we will still receive some answers eventually.

How would you rate customer service and support?

Positive

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

We still use multiple RPAs depending on the customers' requirements, including UiPath and Microsoft Power Automate.

UiPath has the ability to integrate with other products, whereas Automation Anywhere has limitations in integrating with APIs and other OCR tools.

What was our ROI?

We will see a return on investment eventually, but we need to be patient in order to realize the potential that Automation Anywhere offers three years down the line.

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

The price for Automation Anywhere is high. I would rate the cost an eight out of ten, with ten being the highest cost.

What other advice do I have?

I would rate Automation Anywhere eight out of ten. The integrations and pricing model are areas that need improvement. However, Automation Anywhere is a very effective tool, offering its own internal solutions. Automation Anywhere eliminates the need to rely on any other third-party solutions, which is a significant advantage.

For organizations interested in utilizing API automation, there are several tools available in the market. Additionally, numerous BPM tools can be employed for API integration. However, if they require desktop automation or process automation, Automation Anywhere is a recommended tool.

Our IT department maintains the solution. We maintain the bots once a quarter for one hour.

Which deployment model are you using for this solution?

Private Cloud
Disclosure: My company has a business relationship with this vendor other than being a customer: Partner
PeerSpot user
reviewer1464705 - PeerSpot reviewer
Manager, Robotic Process Automation at Celerity IT, LLC
Real User
Good support, improves process efficiency, and the ROI is significant
Pros and Cons
  • "I'd say the most impactful and heavily or commonly used ability of v11 and A2019 has been the ability to integrate other code types and operations within the process."
  • "Having fewer connection instances would make it more secure, more simple to troubleshoot, and possibly more flexible with the type of applications in use."

What is our primary use case?

We have used AA for telecom industry repetitive processes, public retirement firms processes, and financial bank processes. The development has been with local developer desktops, remote VDIs, EC2s, as well as RDP clients of sorts for the individual company preferences.

We are currently building an Azure environment for our A2019 solution internally, with a VDI as our developer/UAT environment. Production will be a separate VDI operating from our main control room instance, as we create Bot Runner agents out of those VDIs for production.

I also deal with many federated lines of business, as they often develop locally and use attended automation as their source of RPA for their lines of business. Others utilize EC2s as their developer and UAT environments and have a separate production import process that keeps the separation of duties intact. Though this is not as productive as that team expected, they use it temporarily until their control room can be migrated and upgraded into A2019 instance as part of another line of business currently building out a sandbox environment for the remainder of 2020.

How has it helped my organization?

I am a consultant and our RPA practice on a personal level has improved the efficiency of the payroll, PTO, and timecard submission process within our company. It has taken time-consuming daily mundane tasks off the plates of our talented finance teams and allowed them to dedicate more productive time to working with more thought-heavy and human-centric activities.

Outside of our company, as we work with clientele, several improvement instances have been evident for those. One company had a very tedious process of monitoring an email inbox for several business units to send emails notifying that their daily database update process was completed. This took many hours of monitoring after hours, but in place of that, the RPA bot was able to perform the monitoring for them of that inbox, perform the necessary follow-up or escalation emails needed, and finalize the process once all was complete. This was unattended automation, saving them precious time, improving morale, and accurately informing everyone of the completion. 

What is most valuable?

Both v11 and A2019 have their strengths but the cloud-based forms with Excel, Microsoft applications, scripts integration, and functionality of A2019 have really stood out above the way v11 can do those things.

It takes far less code to work with A2019 than v11 for the tasks we have in place. In v11, the Metabot features have proven a tremendous help to work with smaller tasks such as file and folder operations, datetime operations, as well as credential management operations.

I'd say the most impactful and heavily or commonly used ability of v11 and A2019 has been the ability to integrate other code types and operations within the process. For example, if someone needed a heavy data comparison process to take place, utilizing AA could work but often takes a good bit of time to work through a large Excel or CSV file. Instead, activating a pre-developed or partner-developed Python script would be my choice because of the speed and efficiency of that language. I currently use this method and it's a major time saver.

What needs improvement?

In terms of improvement, usually, I have found is not as general as people think. Specifically, as a use case, I am excited to see improvements in having an A2019 cloud control room working and improved on the Lenox environments. A good bit of our finance infrastructure for web-based applications is built in that environment.

There is a good bit of dashboard-type development going on in this type of environment already, so the ability to integrate some of the functionality, as well as keep the synchronicity of everything within it, would be a major benefit.

Having fewer connection instances would make it more secure, more simple to troubleshoot, and possibly more flexible with the type of applications in use.  

For how long have I used the solution?

I have been using the AA desktop application versions since 2014 (v09-v11), approximately six years, and A2019 for about four months.

What do I think about the stability of the solution?

I've not had any instability issues but only environmental stability issues that come down to the company that created the environment. 

What do I think about the scalability of the solution?

I find it very scalable, especially with smaller automations, as they can often grow once proven to businesses that the processes work. 

How are customer service and technical support?

The technical support was very knowledgeable, very easy to understand mostly, their ability to work with us to meet the needs and being patient was a huge help. 

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

I did not previously use different versions but currently use both. I do know that going forward with v11 sunsetting in 2021, we are migrating and going through a learning phase of A2019 to fully adapt to that application. 

How was the initial setup?

The A2019 setup was straightforward for the applications themselves. The environments in which they are set up is a different story but, that again is on a per-company basis and often lends itself to the expertise of the DevOps teams. Sometimes, those folks are not familiar with RPA or A2019.  

What about the implementation team?

We implemented through AA directly. The availability of their support was very good. Several meetings and work with their folks went well. 

What was our ROI?

Our ROI has ranged from thousands to hundreds of thousands, depending on the type of process being automated.

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

I really enjoy the pricing options with Automation Anywhere, as they are able to flex their ability to adapt to the needs of the customer really well. I am sure the specifics for some pricing are on a partner-by-partner basis but providing the ability to scale the licenses, setup, and pricing to the customer is a huge benefit with Automation Anywhere.

Their technical support system and response times directly to a partner are really good.

Which other solutions did I evaluate?

We did review UiPath, Blue Prism, and Power Automate. 

What other advice do I have?

I'd say, fully go headfirst into learning the A2019 platform and all it can do for a business. There is something for everyone in that platform. Large or small scale automations, migration processes from v11 is already in place and tested, and there is no more need for Metabots because they are now "packages" that can be made or modified by a seasoned developer, and a plethora of other benefits are evident. Just jump in!! 

Which deployment model are you using for this solution?

Private Cloud

If public cloud, private cloud, or hybrid cloud, which cloud provider do you use?

Microsoft Azure
Disclosure: My company has a business relationship with this vendor other than being a customer: Not only do I run the RPA practice and communicate as a partner with Automation Anywhere, I am an RPA developer as well utilizing the product within our company and building out solutions and automations directly for and with our clients as a developer.
PeerSpot user
Adithya-Kumar - PeerSpot reviewer
Founder at N10 tech
Real User
Helps streamline processes, boosts accuracy, and eliminates downtime
Pros and Cons
  • "The simplicity and ease of use is the most valuable part of Automation Anywhere."
  • "Automation Anywhere could benefit from a more technical focus."

What is our primary use case?

We use Automation Anywhere to automate processes for our clients and have hundreds of use cases. 

We implemented Automation Anywhere for redundant and manual tasks that are data-heavy and do not require a lot of logical reasoning in the process.

We offer cloud-based deployment of Automation Anywhere for our clients. The specific type of deployment depends on each client's needs and preferences. Larger organizations may opt for their private cloud for security and control, while smaller ones might favor the public cloud's lower costs and simpler setup. Ultimately, the ideal deployment model depends on the individual organization's priorities.

How has it helped my organization?

Before Automation Anywhere, all of our processes were manual, time-consuming, and prone to inaccuracies due to human error. Automation Anywhere has transformed our operations by streamlining processes, boosting accuracy, and eliminating downtime.

Business users who have decent logical and problem-solving skills can easily use Automation Anywhere.

The learning curve is linear.

Training non-technical employees to use Automation Anywhere takes around one month.

Integration of automation into our workflows, APIs, business applications, and documents in Automation Anywhere is easy.

The simpler the process and the larger the volume of data involved, the greater the potential for time and cost savings with Automation Anywhere. This is in contrast to more complex processes that require data manipulation and advanced reasoning or decision-making skills, where the benefits might be less pronounced.

What is most valuable?

The simplicity and ease of use is the most valuable part of Automation Anywhere.

What needs improvement?

Automation Anywhere could benefit from a more technical focus. As a developer, comparing it to UiPath, I find UiPath offers greater customization and integration capabilities, particularly with core languages like C#. Automation Anywhere currently seems geared more towards business users, while UiPath caters to technical users. Additionally, UiPath's free community edition appears significantly more robust than Automation Anywhere's.

For how long have I used the solution?

I have been using Automation Anywhere for almost 13 years.

What do I think about the stability of the solution?

The cloud versions of Automation Anywhere are a significant improvement over the earlier desktop versions. I've been using Automation Anywhere since version five, and while the desktop versions were initially unstable, the cloud versions have been much more reliable. I commend the Automation Engineering team for their thorough testing before deployments.

What do I think about the scalability of the solution?

Automation Anywhere's ability to provide automation at scale is good, especially with the control room and the workload management features.

How was the initial setup?

The initial deployment is simple, especially for the cloud version. Just create an account, log in, and install the local connector or bot. Then, connect it to our device and access the website. One technical person can complete the deployment in five minutes.

What other advice do I have?

I would rate Automation Anywhere an eight out of ten.

While everyone seems eager to jump on the AI bandwagon, I believe it's not a mandatory element for every situation. The need for true, cutting-edge AI currently lies in research and development, not in everyday business processes. Current AI implementations tend to be overhyped and unnecessary for many applications.

Upgrading Automation Anywhere is simple in the cloud.

There is no maintenance for the cloud version of Automation Anywhere.

Which deployment model are you using for this solution?

Private Cloud
Disclosure: I am a real user, and this review is based on my own experience and opinions.
Flag as inappropriate
PeerSpot user
Team Lead Development at a logistics company with 10,001+ employees
Real User
Easy to use, has a short learning curve, and helps increase automation consumption
Pros and Cons
  • "The best features are the ease of use, the short learning curve, and the good support from our local partner."
  • "The quality and speed of Automation Anywhere's support need significant improvement."

What is our primary use case?

We use Automation Anywhere to automate websites and extract data from them.

How has it helped my organization?

Automation Anywhere helped us automate human tasks.

The learning curve is quite shallow.

Automation Anywhere has helped our organization by working around the clock, allowing us to rely on robots instead of humans. We no longer have errors, or if we do have some problems, we are informed. It is easy to implement and monitor the processing part of the software.

Cloud-based Automation Anywhere provides automation at scale with ease.

The integration of RPA bots, APIs, business applications, and documents in Automation Anywhere is good.

Automation Anywhere has helped our organization increase our automation consumption.

What is most valuable?

The best features are the ease of use, the short learning curve, and the good support from our local partner.

What needs improvement?

The quality and speed of Automation Anywhere's support needs significant improvement. We are not satisfied with the quality of support.

For how long have I used the solution?

I have been using Automation Anywhere for two years.

What do I think about the stability of the solution?

It is stable.

What do I think about the scalability of the solution?

Automation Anywhere is scalable.

How are customer service and support?

The technical support is not good. They are slow and the level of support is poor.

How would you rate customer service and support?

Neutral

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

We tried using Blue Prism for one of our projects but ran into a lot of complications when we tried to implement it ourselves. We found Automation Anywhere much easier to implement.

How was the initial setup?

We had an enablement package, which we could start using because Automation Anywhere turned it on automatically. We did not need to set it up ourselves, as it was only for bots running in our environment. It was not difficult.

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

The price for Automation Anywhere is reasonable.

Which other solutions did I evaluate?

We also evaluated UiPath, which has similar quality and features to Automation Anywhere. However, we chose Automation Anywhere because we had someone in our organization who was familiar with it. Blue Prism is significantly inferior to both UiPath and Automation Anywhere.

What other advice do I have?

I would give Automation Anywhere an eight out of ten.

API is our first choice whenever possible, but it is not always feasible, depending on the use case. Sometimes, we need to perform additional process steps beyond simply calling an API. In such cases, we may consider using an RPA tool, such as Automation Anywhere, especially if we do not have an API.

Typical maintenance is required. If we get new versions of bots, we need to update Automation Anywhere. However, the cloud services are maintained by Automation Anywhere itself, so we don't have to worry about that.

I recommend looking at IQ Bots, a very good and easy-to-use intelligent document-processing feature. I also advise taking the quick training available online and trying to build a simple but real process on their own. There is also a community edition that anyone can use, so it's easy to start with that to try out Automation Anywhere.

Which deployment model are you using for this solution?

Hybrid Cloud
Disclosure: I am a real user, and this review is based on my own experience and opinions.
Flag as inappropriate
PeerSpot user
Buyer's Guide
Download our free Automation Anywhere (AA) Report and get advice and tips from experienced pros sharing their opinions.
Updated: April 2024
Buyer's Guide
Download our free Automation Anywhere (AA) Report and get advice and tips from experienced pros sharing their opinions.