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Reviews from AWS customer

34 AWS reviews

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5,698 reviews
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3-star reviews ( Show all reviews )

    Karthick Chandra

I don't have much technical knowledge, but I learned the solution in a month using the vendor's training courses

  • September 25, 2023
  • Review provided by PeerSpot

What is our primary use case?

The use cases I use Automation Anywhere for are for healthcare and revenue.

How has it helped my organization?

From the customer's perspective, the biggest benefits are automation of the security and monitoring systems. Our automation consumption has increased considerably since we began using Automation Anywhere. Initially, we were using two or three bots. Now, we have almost 25. In terms of revenue, we can save around $10 million through automation. We still have room to expand, and we're looking to implement more bots, especially IQ bots, but we have some concerns about the accuracy level.

What is most valuable?

Automation Anywhere is easy to learn for business users without technical knowledge. For example, I don't have much technical knowledge, but I learned how to use the solution from Automation Anywhere University. It's a user-friendly solution everyone can understand and implement in their business with the help of Automation Anywhere University. The university is more than enough to develop a small bot. It's a comfortable platform. Even the new employees who don't know about automation can gain experience. It only took me about one month to learn the solution.

What needs improvement?

The IQ Bots have a lot of room for improvement in terms of accuracy level. We need to improvise a lot. I'm facing another big challenge with one of the use cases. We raised a ticket and did multiple follow-ups with support, but the accuracy still isn't up to the mark.

We've been exploring FortressIQ and tools that use AI/ML in the past three or four months. We're looking at ways to implement those tools in new areas, but there is a gap because Automation Anywhere University doesn't have much information about them yet.

We have web recording applications, so we need something like AI to be involved where we can give a verbal command, and the bot can learn to do an automated process. That's the kind of technology or innovation required from the business perspective. If a business consultant can interact with a generative AI or some other advanced AI that can act as a developer, the development cost will come down drastically.

For how long have I used the solution?

I have used Automation Anywhere for more than six years.

How are customer service and support?

I rate Automation Anywhere support seven out of 10.

How would you rate customer service and support?

Neutral

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

I don't deal with purchasing, but I know that Automation Anywhere is more cost-effective than Blue Prism. I won't say the cost is low, but I can say that it's cost-effective.

What other advice do I have?

I rate Automation Anywhere seven out of 10 overall.


    reviewer1541967

Automation at scale is a strength, but certain types of CRM integration are challenging

  • September 04, 2023
  • Review provided by PeerSpot

What is our primary use case?

Our clients use it for different things. One uses it for invoice processing and another for the aggregation of documents based on certain characters. Another uses it to automate processes for the admin department. That company has seasonal workers, and they have to create passes for those seasonal workers. Most of the document uploading and validation is done by Automation Anywhere. Most of those documents are issued by the federal government, and they have a standard format.

What is most valuable?

One thing I really like is the recorder where you can connect with multiple systems. The OCR is also good. In one case, we used a different OCR than Automation Anywhere, but in document processing, using the OCR engine is good.

And providing automation at scale is something I feel is a strength of Automation Anywhere compared to most tools. It depends on the segment we are dealing with. There are small organizations that might not need robust applications, but for mid-sized and large customers, we usually propose automation anywhere. It's quite robust, and the performance is good. When we are proposing a solution, the automation at scale makes it much easier for us, post-sales and post-implementation.

Also, the integration of the solution's bots with APIs and business applications is good. There are certain prebuilt integration APIs in Automation Anywhere. That's especially true when you're connecting with SAP. There are issues with SAP, but in general, they have connectors with most of the popular CRM tools. The API connectivity is much easier.

What needs improvement?

We only faced some problems when integrating it with SAP, and Oracle integration was a bit challenging, especially with Oracle Fusion. We had some issues when we were trying to connect some of the applications on the API level. But, in general, integration using Automation Anywhere is fine.

For how long have I used the solution?

I have been working with Automation Anywhere since 2019, or about four years.

How was the initial setup?

In the last year, the cloud has become bigger, but before that, it was implemented more on-prem only.

From our side, the number of staff needed for an implementation depends on the number of processes we need to deploy. For the initial configuration, we may not need many people. But, for one of our customers, there are 70 processes that need to be developed over the next 18 months. Obviously, the number of people involved will be much greater than in a project where we're looking at 10 or 15 processes to be implemented. But on average, each process takes at least two to three resources, depending on the complexity.

Once you have deployed an application, you need to maintain it. Compared to other products, it takes slightly fewer people. Maintenance on the admin side requires one to two people. We always assign one FTE for this, at a minimum. Depending on other factors, we might go for two.

Which other solutions did I evaluate?

Automation Anywhere is more stable compared to some of the other tools on the market. And, post-implementation, we have very few issues with it compared to others. For me, it's all about post-implementation and why customers are happier with Automation Anywhere.

For small and medium-sized customers, we may not suggest Automation Anywhere because of the cost difference.

UiPath has gotten much better in the last two years. They have really grown in terms of overall performance and bot capabilities. There has been a huge improvement there.

What other advice do I have?

As for non-technical users, it's not a low-code type of solution where you draw and drag and drop. Still, it's okay, to some extent, if they at least have some understanding of technology. Generally, it's easy to learn. If you have access to Automation Anywhere University, you can really learn it. But because I am from a technology background, it was much easier for me. We give our customers 13 or 14 sessions to bring them up to speed, and that might span over the period of a month to two months.

In the discussion about RPA versus API integration, one definite advantage of automation is that scheduling, bot management, and those kinds of things are automated. It's more about the customer and their perspective. With automation, you already have something cooked up, and you don't have to worry about much at a later stage. That makes automation much easier for them than using an API integration. You have to maintain an API integration, and there is the cost of maintaining it. With all those factors, automation becomes much easier for the customer.

We have been proposing Automation Anywhere to multiple customers. It's good. It's robust. But it's a bit expensive compared to other RPA tools on the market. Sometimes, it's too heavy for customers, especially if it's on-prem. Also, maintenance is slightly higher.


    reviewer2268915

Easy to deploy and configure but needs to be more multi-platform

  • August 31, 2023
  • Review provided by PeerSpot

What is our primary use case?

Automation Anywhere is similar to Blue Prism. We do a lot of process mining and RPA tasks. We've used it in some very large companies. It's for automating activities in large service centers like home loan originations, insurance claims, or for service desks for utilities for telephone companies.

How has it helped my organization?

Companies were trying to eliminate a lot of manual processes that were being handled by people at keyboards and some of the repetitive nature. A lot of it is the front-end handling of incoming phone calls or incoming service requests that might be sent via email or text. Rather than having people look at the request on a green screen or on a website, the robots would actually handle some of the routing of the requests or the routing of the documents. For example, for a home loan application or some kind of claim. A lot of the time, most of the companies have people sitting in a service center, receiving those requests and reviewing them. However, now, a lot of the inputting of the data can be handled by the robot.

What is most valuable?

The solution is easy to deploy. It scales. It's easy to configure. They are pretty generic. There's not a lot of difference between any of the three big RPAs.

Automation Anywhere is very focused on the Microsoft world. They don't do anything other than Windows and Microsoft, whereas Blue Prism and UiPath compete with other platforms.

The learning curve is low. It's faster to learn than the others.

Some people in my company have used the Co-Pilot functionality. Right now, they use Salesforce, although they have their own RPA now and they are going to replace it with MuleSoft's automation.

Automation Anywhere's ability to provide automation at scale for Microsoft is excellent.

The integration of RPA bots, APIs, or business applications and documents is pretty robust.

What needs improvement?

They should consider being more multi-platform.

For how long have I used the solution?

I've used the solution since 2018. I've used it for about five years.

How are customer service and support?

I've never used technical support.

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

I've also used Blue Prism in the past.

How was the initial setup?

My understanding is that the initial setup is pretty straightforward.

The project would dictate how long it would take to deploy. It could take a couple of days to a couple of months. There's a question of governance proliferation and compliance that needs to be considered in RPA. The internal policies would affect the overall setup.

There is maintenance in the form of updates. It doesn't take much maintenance. We don't use bots and therefore do not need to maintain them.

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

I don't have any thoughts on pricing or licensing.

What other advice do I have?

For someone who wants to use an API integration instead of a robust process automation solution, I'd advise it depends on the culture of the company, and the complexity of the integration that one wants to do. Depending on the culture, on average, it's a 50/50 split. There are some environments where RPA is the right thing to do since it's quicker. It's faster. It's easier to manage them from the perspective of just configuring the conformance and compliance with internal policy. However, in other parts of the same organization, you might need API integration depending on what you're integrating.

I'd rate the solution seven out of ten. Nobody gets a ten. Nobody's perfect.


    Swati Srivastava.

Integrates well with SAP and API-to-API, but complex processes are difficult to automate

  • August 16, 2023
  • Review provided by PeerSpot

What is our primary use case?

We use it for processes related to IT operations in the manufacturing industry.

How has it helped my organization?

There are hectic IT processes, jobs that run overnight, weekly, and monthly. We can optimize, rewrite, and automate them. They represent the most important use cases that I have been involved with: IT operations and software for manufacturing.

It has helped our organization increase automation consumption by 20 to 30 percent.

What is most valuable?

The most valuable feature is the Control Room.

Also, the integration of RPA bots with other processes and documents is good. We don't have any issues there. We could have more connectors, but it's fine. I have used it for SAP and for direct API-to-API, and that went well.

What needs improvement?

It is good for standard procedures with an SOP. For those, it works well. But there are processes that are tricky and need human intervention and intelligence. In those cases, the process gets stuck. Something that is a straight-ahead process—you do A, B, C, and D—is fine. But when you do A and then have to decide whether to do B or C, where there is a need for logical thinking and human intervention, we find it difficult to automate those cases. We have to break down those processes and do that tweaking.

We would like to see a more seamless UI, and we would like AI help. Wherever we are stuck or there is a logical error, AI help, with prompting and suggestions on what to do, would be good. If I have dragged and dropped something in the wrong logical sequence and it fails during execution, there should be automated AI help.

We use NetBeans IDE where we get something like automated help, but that's a platform for doing standard Java and PHP development. Automated help is coming up more and more in many tools. For example, Microsoft is providing it. We would like to have something like that in Automation Anywhere, with automated debugging and self-help.

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?

Overall, the product is stable for SOP-based use cases. It is not very stable for complex use cases.

What do I think about the scalability of the solution?

It is not very scalable for complex use cases.

How are customer service and support?

Their technical support is good overall, not excellent. They can improve the response time and on-call support. We have SLAs, so we need support to be immediate.

How would you rate customer service and support?

Neutral

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

We did not have a previous solution.

How was the initial setup?

Recently, automation has gone to the cloud, and that has been most beneficial because installation was quite hectic before. On-prem was quite difficult, but the moment they launched the cloud version, it became easy.

With on-prem, there were issues with installation over production as well as the setup of the Control Room. Often, the Control Room would go down or hang, and we would have to do restarts. It was not seamless.

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

The licensing cost could be improved. It costs a lot. At the very least, the developer licenses and the control panels should be made free to enterprises, and the production environment licensed. Production should bear the cost; we would be okay with that, but not the development side.

What other advice do I have?

Business users didn't find it that easy to use, but for developers who are building the use cases, it's quite easy. For the business users, the issues were standard ones, such as navigation, user friendliness, and the terminologies that they needed to understand. They often require training before using it, and not just one training session, but training and retraining. On a scale where 10 represents a low learning curve and one is a large learning curve, Automation Anywhere is a seven. For non-technical people, it's difficult. For them, the learning curve is a four or five. It usually takes four to five months for them to be able to really use it on their own.

We have developed solutions for IT back-end processes, so there are no end-users. These jobs run weekly, fortnightly, and monthly. There are two or three people involved with it, but it's the jobs that we have automated.

We need three to four people to maintain the solutions, but that doesn't take a lot of time—about four hours a week. It's not something that needs to be done every day. Before the jobs run, they check to make sure everything is okay, that no errors or notifications are coming up. The maintenance is very low.

Automation Anywhere is good but not exceptional. It's good because, for simple use cases, we use it with different technologies. For complex processes, automations should perform better.


    Somasundaram N.

Aids customers in enhancing productivity and has a shallow learning curve, but does not integrate well with ERP systems

  • July 31, 2023
  • Review provided by PeerSpot

What is our primary use case?

We are a partner of Automation Anywhere, and we utilize their software in the manufacturing industry for procurement and administration purposes.

Most of our customers deploy the solution on the public cloud, with some opting for private cloud deployment, and a small percentage choosing on-premises deployment. The majority of our customers are extremely price-conscious.

We deploy Automation Anywhere for our cost-effective customers. These customers prioritize automation for fee optimization rather than productivity improvement.

How has it helped my organization?

Business users without technical skills can still utilize Automation Anywhere with some training. The solution is user-friendly, however, we provide training for individuals before they come on board. Therefore, there is support available in that regard.

On average it takes two months to train someone without technical skills to use Automation Anywhere.

Automation Anywhere aids our customers in enhancing productivity and optimizing workforce size. Typically, we achieve a 25 to 30 percent reduction in time, although the exact results may vary depending on the specific case.

Although Automation Anywhere may not match Blue Prism's scale of automation due to budget constraints, our current clients can still have their requirements met by Automation Anywhere.

What is most valuable?

Automation Anywhere's most valuable feature is its seamless integration into procurement software, allowing for the automation of purchase orders, billing, employee travel details, and other tasks.

What needs improvement?

Integrating RPA bots, APIs, business applications, and documents in Automation Anywhere is a challenging task. We have come across a type of YAML application that we use with the APIs, enabling us to get a holistic picture. However, direct integration has always been problematic. For instance, when attempting to integrate with SAP, we encounter certain gaps. As a solution, we can either input the data into the call sheet or create a YAML application for the integration process. Unfortunately, it is not a seamless process where we can transfer everything directly into an SAP system. This presents a double issue for us. I would like Automation Anywhere to work with SAP and improve their interfaces.

The technical support needs improvement. They take a long time to respond, and they are not very knowledgeable.

For how long have I used the solution?

I have been using Automation Anywhere for six years.

What do I think about the stability of the solution?

Automation Anywhere is stable.

What do I think about the scalability of the solution?

Automation Anywhere can scale, but it requires significant intervention from the technical team to achieve.

How are customer service and support?

Technical support is difficult to reach and obtain a resolution.

How would you rate customer service and support?

Neutral

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

We used to use Blue Prism for our customers, which offered better integration and more features. However, we had to switch to Automation Anywhere due to the high initial license fee associated with Blue Prism. Automation Anywhere is more cost-effective.

How was the initial setup?

The initial setup is straightforward. The complexity lies within the interfaces. Our development team handles the internal implementation for our customers.

What about the implementation team?

We implement the solution for our customers.

What was our ROI?

Our clients definitely see a return on investment because that's how we gain business.

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

I would rate Automation Anywhere's cost a six out of ten, with ten being the most expensive.

What other advice do I have?

I would rate Automation Anywhere a six out of ten. When compared to other options, Automation Anywhere remains a more cost-effective solution. However, it has integration issues and is not directly compatible with many ERP systems, which forces us to find numerous workarounds.

In recent years, there have been many cheaper solutions that have become available. To a certain extent, I believe these solutions need to meet the current requirements. We began using Automation Anywhere years ago, but with new clients, there is a bit of a challenge to convince them to adopt the solution due to the availability of other options in the market.

With the variety of solutions available in the market today, people are seeking the most cost-effective option. RPA was a viable choice a few years ago when we began in 2017. However, attitudes have since changed, leading people to consider more affordable tools. Additionally, individuals are reluctant to bear substantial license charges, as we faced with Automation Anywhere, where we had to pay significant fees annually.

Automation Anywhere is more commonly deployed across various departments and less frequently in multiple locations. Due to its typical usage, we are employing it as a standalone model for each functional department.

Automation Anywhere requires maintenance due to changes we handle from the client center, as well as the configuration of the solution according to all client requirements. We need more than five people for the maintenance.

We spend one to two months maintaining bots.

For an organization that has a technical team and wants to deploy a cost-effective solution, I recommend Automation Anywhere.


    Ananthu Krishnan S.

Very Easy To Use Automation Too With Accuracy Issues.

  • July 24, 2023
  • Review provided by G2

What do you like best about the product?
Easy to use, no coding experience required, no big software needs to install, easy access for authorized users, easy to configure machine. High accurate SAP commands.
What do you dislike about the product?
Bugs which come after new release, old commands which were working perfectly starts to cause issues.
What problems is the product solving and how is that benefiting you?
Automating client's processes and makes it faster and accurate . Less human resource is spend on a specific tasks.


    Akhil Varala

Monitors all our bots from a centralized place and is easy to configure templates, but the UI is not intuitive

  • July 21, 2023
  • Review provided by PeerSpot

What is our primary use case?

There are many use cases for Automation Anywhere. One of these involved reconciling numerous financial reports in the company I work for, which deals in consumer products and goods. Specifically, we handle credit notes and debit notes from various customers. These notes serve as certifications of transactions, indicating whether we owe something to the customers or they owe something to us. The challenge is that these notes come in different formats, all in PDFs. Consequently, someone has to manually go through each of them, input the data into Excel, and compare it with an existing Excel report. After verifying the information and ensuring it matches, we input the data into the SAP system. This process is a part of our monthly activities and involves a considerable volume of documents, given that we are a multinational company focusing on AMEA markets.

To streamline this process, we utilized Automation Anywhere, making use of OCR technology to extract data from the PDFs. Another use case for the automation tool involved generating aging reports. As a company, we deal with numerous customers who haven't made payments yet, and we need to monitor the time they have left to pay or identify if they have exceeded the due dates. This information is available on our SAP system and needs to be created daily and distributed to all our sales teams.

How has it helped my organization?

If someone without technical skills wants to learn to use Automation Anywhere, it's not very difficult. However, if we simply want to use the solution without any prior experience, it may not be possible, but with proper training, someone can learn it in a month.

The learning curve is relatively easy, and it just takes time. Getting comfortable with the tool is, in my opinion, quite feasible; it can be done. The other aspect of the problem is understanding the use case and how to design it. How will we design our system? How will we design our process? Because it's never just one process that someone wants to automate; it's usually a bundle of processes. When we obtain a bot from automation anywhere, we cannot get just a fraction of a bot. We have to get a full bot. And if we have a process that does not consume all of that, then our cost-benefit ratio doesn't work. So we need to have a bunch of processes and then figure out how to schedule each bot, and how to process it. There are multiple ways of designing the flow of a bot. We should look for the optimum way considering the context, it depends on our context. The templates keep changing, and the sales keep changing, so we would have to define it in a different way where we have templates that can be replaceable. But if we are dealing with something related to compliance, then we would prioritize reliability and robustness, and we may have to compromise on flexibility while designing a solution with robustness in mind.

All of that comes with expertise, and all of that comes with experience. However, just understanding the product and the tool to a good, fairly okay level where a business user can create a small automation and do something with it even if they don't fully maximize its value can be achieved in a couple of months. But becoming a true expert and being able to call ourselves an RPA expert will take a lot of time and further exposure to various use cases.

By using Automation Anywhere, we observed a reduction in paperwork costs and the implementation of a reliable bot. When we require manual report generation, workflow execution, and other tasks. Its efficiency is contingent upon the availability of the person overseeing the process. With Automation Anywhere, the reporting, workflow executions, and other tasks are automated and thereby enhancing overall reliability. Additionally, a notable advantage is the development of a digital mindset within the company. Exposure to automation fosters a digital way of thinking among employees, leading them to identify opportunities that can be automated. These benefits are just a few among several others, including financial gains and improved compliance.

The benefits are seen typically after three to four months per process, depending on its complexity. For processes of low to medium complexity, it usually takes about three to four months for the board to start functioning correctly. The payback ratio varies depending on the number of products or processes we have and their complexity. If we have many low-complexity processes that can be completed within six months, we will see returns on our investment within that time frame. However, it's important to note that the payback period ultimately depends on the complexity of the process. I have observed instances where processes have not yielded returns even after several months, as changes were required at three or six-month intervals, leading to additional expenses. So, the success of the process is contingent on its specific characteristics.

Automation Anywhere is able to provide automation at scale.

Integration is truly beneficial; it serves as a significant advantage of Automation Anywhere. The level of integration is highly commendable.

Automation Anywhere has helped our organization increase its automation consumption by around 50 percent.

What is most valuable?

The way templates can be configured is quite simple - it's a matter of drag and drop. Within the console, which is easy to navigate if we've seen it before, we can understand how things work. This allows business folks to join calls if needed, and I comprehend what happens within the console.

The Board Control room is a centralized place where we can monitor all our bots and see how they are running when they are scheduled to run, and how our CPU and CB usage are looking - basically, the entire orchestration.

I noticed that they opened up to other service providers like Accenture and Avaya, which is not a platform feature, but it was very helpful for us. Automation Anywhere, being a product company, might not excel in service, so partnering with companies like Avaya or Accenture provided us with a reliable service operation.

What needs improvement?

The capability of understanding and extracting documents is not very good. Therefore, automating unstructured documents or any structured documents that we want to automate on Automation Anywhere is not a good idea.

The UI is not intuitive and doesn't come across as smooth.

I would like the licenses to be transferable. Currently, we are unable to transfer a user license.

For how long have I used the solution?

I have been using Automation Anywhere for three and a half years.

What do I think about the stability of the solution?

I give the stability of Automation Anywhere a six out of ten.

What do I think about the scalability of the solution?

I give the scalability of Automation Anywhere an eight out of ten.

What was our ROI?

We saw a return on investment with 50 percent of our automation processes.

What other advice do I have?

I give Automation Anywhere a six out of ten.

It depends on the specific capabilities you require. When we started out as a team at Mondelez we were setting up all the necessary components. At that time, we were primarily focused on basic capabilities such as having a good service partner, efficient bot operations, and a manageable console. Figuring out the licenses was crucial, as some companies were unwilling to share their licenses with others. So, if you had the license, you were the one responsible for using it, and it couldn't be transferred to someone else. Certain software had this complexity, and we were also not considering advanced features like OCR back then.

Our focus was on basic RPA without many complexities. About four years ago, we believed Automation Anywhere was a well-established player in the market, so we chose them. However, later on, we realized that automation had much more to offer than simply configuring and automating certain processes. We discovered the concept of hyper-automation, which includes low-code and no-code applications that business users can build themselves. Document-related automation became crucial, and we found that Automation Anywhere lacked proper support for structured documentation and didn't leverage artificial intelligence or natural language processing effectively. Consequently, we had to explore other software options. As time progressed, we recognized the need for more capabilities. Therefore, we adopted two approaches to address this. Firstly, we sought a solution that offered modular usability. Consequently, we included Power Platform and are currently exploring the UI part. Additionally, we ventured into using newer technologies like Blue Prism, experimenting with various possibilities. Ultimately, our aim is to stay on top of advancements and adopt the best-suited tools for our needs.

The preference for API integration over a robust process automation solution depends on the capabilities of our in-house tech team. If we have an in-house tech team, then API solutions are significantly better than an automated bot. Additionally, our cost-benefit analysis, in terms of tech capabilities, also plays a crucial role in the decision-making process.

We did not perform any maintenance on Automation Anywhere.


    ChristianTorres

Helps to automate a lot of processes, but should work consistently with web applications

  • July 18, 2023
  • Review provided by PeerSpot

What is our primary use case?

We have automated some data entry scenarios. We also have automation for system monitoring. It is being used for data entry, system monitoring, and data exchange with other systems.

How has it helped my organization?

We found a lot of processes to automate. We currently have about 80 processes that we have automated.

Automation Anywhere has helped our organization increase its automation consumption, but we are a little short of RPA developers. We are acquiring new talent and new resources for that group, and we are on the right path. We have a lot of work.

What is most valuable?

Workbench, which is a development tool, is very friendly. It is complete. Compared to Power Automate, Automation Anywhere is much more comprehensive and easy to understand.

We use APIs for some bots. It is not too common, but we use APIs in some processes. The integration at the moment is easy.

What needs improvement?

We work with version 11, and we have some problems with some applications. Automation Anywhere's software does not recognize them properly. The recognition of web applications is not good. The software does not consistently recognize all the controls and objects. We are in the process of migrating to a new version. We are migrating to Automation Anywhere 360, and I hope that in the latest version, the recognition model can be better. On the Internet and various forums, many people say that Automation Anywhere 360 appears to be much better, but we have not implemented it yet. I hope it is better and consistent. The main problem is consistency. If I make a bot today and tomorrow if the application changes, the bot stops working.

Similarly, in terms of the ability to provide automation at scale, the new version is more focused on that. The version that we have is not that capable. The development is not too easy. We need to put in too much effort, but Automation 360 appears to be easier. Development takes less time.

Automation Anywhere is a technical application. It is not so easy for a regular user. It requires technical knowledge. The new version is more user-friendly from an ease-of-use perspective.

For how long have I used the solution?

I have been using this solution for three to four years.

How are customer service and support?

I would rate their technical support a nine out of ten.

How would you rate customer service and support?

Positive

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

We are still using Power Automate, but we are not using their RPA model. We only use Power Automate for other automations. When we chose our RPA tool, Microsoft had not released the RPA tool for Power Automate. Microsoft released it a year or two years later.

What was our ROI?

We have some processes to analyze the ROI, but right now, we are not focusing on knowing that information. Our main need is automation. ROI is important, but it is not critical at the moment. We are still automating projects in the company.

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

It is expensive. I would rate Automation Anywhere an eight out of ten in terms of pricing.

They bill for every IQ bot that you have. We do not use IQ Bot, but we have a license, and they bill for every thousand pages.

Which other solutions did I evaluate?

We evaluated one or two other options, but I was not a part of the evaluation.

We did a little bit of research, and we found that Automation Anywhere was recommended at that time. It had better reviews on the Gartner website, so we decided to go with it.

What other advice do I have?

It takes about three to four months to learn it. Some of the things are easy, but because we are trying to do automations, we need to make sure that we understand the application properly. We need to know how it works internally in the structure of the code because sometimes, we make a programming change that works today but stops working tomorrow. That is because the application can change, so we need to understand how the controls work between the changes and have the logic that allows a bot to run smoothly irrespective of the application changes. It is challenging to analyze the changes in the application and find a way to program the bot to recognize the changes.

To someone who wants to use API integration instead of an RPA solution, I would say that API integration is more recommended, but sometimes there are issues with this type of integration, so we have to finish the project in Automation Anywhere. The first option that we always try is to create our own integration between the systems with APIs. The RPA tool is the last option for integration.

In terms of maintenance, we need to install the updates or patches. Our infrastructure team is in charge of that. We have technicians to install patches. We have people with different roles. They are technical leaders or system administrators. We also have an information security team, and we have a network team, as well as an operating system team. Every department makes a little contribution to the whole environment.

For managing the bots, we have only three people. Maintenance of bots is different because we have bots scheduled all day, so we still need to monitor them on a daily basis, but the update process is monthly. We verify what is pending. Overall, the maintenance takes about eight hours a month.

I would rate Automation Anywhere a seven out of ten.


    Kumar Animesh

A fast solution with good a licensing cost, but the UI and stability can be better

  • July 14, 2023
  • Review from a verified AWS customer

How has it helped my organization?

It helps to free up our staff to work on value-add projects. It has saved their effort. With the automation of their project, a task that would have previously taken ten hours can now be done within four hours. We can then have them on other projects where more resources are required. They can utilize that time.

Automation Anywhere has helped our organization increase its automation consumption. In the last three years, we have used Automation Anywhere excessively, and in terms of cost, we have saved up to 50,000 to 60,000 dollars in three years.

What is most valuable?

I have used Automation Anywhere, UiPath, and Blue Prism. The licensing cost of Automation Anywhere is better than UiPath and Blue Prism.

Features such as MetaBot and IQ Bot are very advanced and capable as compared to reading PDFs using OCR.

What needs improvement?

It is very easy for me to use, but for non-technical users, Automation Anywhere is a little bit challenging. If you have previously worked with any other tool, such as Blue Prism, it is a little bit difficult to understand because the nomenclature and terminologies are a little bit tricky. After you have hands-on experience with it for six to seven months, it is quite easy to understand. 

Automation Anywhere's UI is difficult. Its user interface can be improved.

They can improve their community so that if any help is required or if we face any issues, we can easily go there and get the help needed. In the case of both UiPath and Blue Prism, the community is very good. Everything is mentioned in the community. We just need to type a keyword, and we get the solution we need. It would be great if Automation Anywhere could improve their community.

In terms of additional features, there could be support for the cloud-based technology so that, similar to Orchestrator, we can use the control center from the cloud. It should be on-premises because a lot of financial institutes use automation, and they cannot upload their data or transfer their data to a third-party cloud. It would be good if they could host the system on the organization's premises.

For how long have I used the solution?

I have been using this solution for the last five to six years. I am not using its latest version.

What do I think about the stability of the solution?

It is not as stable as UiPath and Blue Prism. There are some software crashes.

What do I think about the scalability of the solution?

It is scalable but they need to enhance their product so that when any huge load of data comes, it does not crash. If we have to work on a million records of Excel data, it would crash.

How are customer service and support?

They have a support channel where we can raise our concerns. If we cannot understand something or we do not have a solution for something, we can raise our concerns and requests in their support channel, and they provide the response or solution. We just need to create a ticket. I would rate their support an eight out of ten. Their support is good.

How would you rate customer service and support?

Positive

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

I have been working in the automation field for the last 11 years. I started my journey with Automation Anywhere, version 10.7. After that, I started working with UiPath and Blue Prism. I work with all three RPA solutions. I am an expert in all these three solutions, and I am also certified in these three solutions.

We utilize a solution as per the requirement or process. UiPath and Blue Prism are easier to learn than Automation Anywhere. In terms of performance, if you use heavy logic or complex logic, Automation Anywhere isn't as stable as compared to UiPath and Blue Prism. Blue Prism is very stable if you build any process or do automation of any process, whereas in the case of Automation Anywhere, your application or your process can break. However, Automation Anywhere is quite fast. The setup is quite easy. You can easily set it up on your system. The UI is very fast. There is no lag.

How was the initial setup?

I installed it on my personal laptop, and it was straightforward, but for the production environment, the Infra team takes care of the installation. It takes them a maximum of two to three hours.

It is on a cloud. It is hosted in the Citrix environment, and it is being used by multiple departments. We need to log in to Citrix to utilize it.

Its maintenance is handled by our Infra team. If there is a patch release with a feature or fix that we need, the Infra team updates its version. Otherwise, we keep utilizing the same version. Our Infra team has access to the Citrix environment. They can create and close the Citrix environment, and that is why they do the maintenance. Any maintenance activities are done over weekends so that none of the in-progress processes get affected. Generally, they happen over weekends. They usually start on Saturday and then the activities are complete by Monday morning.

What was our ROI?

We are investing a lot in the licensing cost. If there was no ROI, our organization would not invest in it. We calculate the efficiency in terms of the effort saved by our full-time employees, which could vary depending on the processes. There could be 2% or 5% savings monthly, and based on that, we calculate the annual savings. Overall, there could be a 10% to 12% improvement in efficiency.

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

Automation Anywhere's licensing cost is better than UiPath and Blue Prism. The licensing cost is a big factor because you might have 50 or more bots, and the per-bot license cost is about $5,000. That is the amount that you need to invest.

Which other solutions did I evaluate?

We have explored various RPA solutions such as Kofax. We generally go for solutions like Automation Anywhere, UiPath, and Blue Prism because of their capabilities. Our clients also want the best and the most cost-effective technology.

What other advice do I have?

I would recommend Automation Anywhere, but it also depends on the cost. If you get a good discount on the license, go for it.

Automation Anywhere is easy to learn if you have experience with automation tools. If you are starting from the beginning, you will have to invest more time compared to the other RPA tools. It could be a bit difficult for non-technical users. You at least need to know what data variables do and what strings do. All these things are technical. You would also need to write VB or C# code, so non-technical people cannot work on these things.

Any integration completely depends on the application support. We have integrated ServiceNow API with Automation Anywhere. If the API is already provided by the organization or the development team, it is quite easy, but if we have to design the API or it is not available, it is a little bit difficult to integrate the application with the automation tool.

To someone who wants to use API integration instead of an RPA solution, I would say that based on my understanding, API integration is completely different from RPA. RPA is an end-to-end solution. It can automate your desktop applications. It can automate your browser-based application. API and web services are also included in RPA, so RPA is a complete ecosystem. API is just one part of it. Only through API, you cannot do automation. Through API, you can get values, and you can put values. You can modify values. You can generate a request or an incident, but creating a report via that data and replacing that data is not possible through API. You have to do it manually, or you have to open it in Tableau or Power BI and create a dashboard. By using an RPA tool, you can download data. You can change the request. You can get the request. You can modify those values and manipulate them according to your requirement. You can then create a dashboard. 

Overall, I would rate Automation Anywhere a seven out of ten because of the stability and the terminology used in the product. The terminology they use is not for the layman. If I have to showcase it to my leadership, they would not be able to understand what MetaBot and IQ Bot are and why we use them. I have to make them understand in layman's language.

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?

Amazon Web Services (AWS)


    Vjaindra Sonawwane.

Performs efficiently and helps reduce workload, but is complex to learn

  • July 06, 2023
  • Review provided by PeerSpot

What is our primary use case?

We use Automation Anywhere for process automation.

How has it helped my organization?

Automation Anywhere has enabled us to eliminate manual, time-consuming tasks, and increase accuracy within our organization by automating them.

We witnessed the benefits of Automation Anywhere within six months of its deployment.

Automation Anywhere helped reduce the workload of our P2P billings by around 60 percent.

Automation Anywhere helped our organization increase its automation consumption by 25 percent on our billing automation once we resolved all the background issues.

What is most valuable?

Automation Anywhere performs efficiently.

What needs improvement?

Automation Anywhere is difficult to use and could be made more user-friendly. The GUI needs to be improved.

Using Automation Anywhere can be extremely difficult for individuals who lack technical skills.

The learning curve for Automation Anywhere is challenging. We should not need to rely on a vendor to handle the solution. The end-user should be able to use the solution independently.

The automation at scale has room for improvement.

There are many features missing from Automation Anywhere, including cloud collaboration tools provided by Google and Microsoft, that I would like to see integrated into the solution.

For how long have I used the solution?

I have been using Automation Anywhere for three years.

What do I think about the stability of the solution?

Automation Anywhere is stable. I rate the stability an eight out of ten.

What do I think about the scalability of the solution?

Scalability involves both the customer and the vendor, requiring significant effort to increase due to its lack of user-friendliness.

How are customer service and support?

We experience difficulties in getting our issues resolved when dealing with technical support.

How would you rate customer service and support?

Neutral

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

I used Microsoft Power Automate, which was not a great application at the time. However, it has now become easier to use, more cost-effective, and more scalable compared to Automation Anywhere. As a result, we are considering switching back to it.

How was the initial setup?

The initial setup was complex. The vendor was unfamiliar with the process, and there was no guidance from Automation Anywhere regarding the requirements. According to Automation Anywhere, we were supposed to simply follow the onscreen instructions and click "next," which should have taken a maximum of one hour. However, due to an error and misunderstanding, it took us around three days instead.

The deployment started at the control room, then the client, and finally the developer.

One person, who was an Automation Anywhere specialist with infrastructure knowledge, was used for the deployment.

What about the implementation team?

We used a vendor for the implementation.

What was our ROI?

To realize a return on investment, we must utilize Automation Anywhere for several years.

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

Automation Anywhere is significantly expensive. The cost is at the highest end of the spectrum.

In addition to the licensing cost, let's say, $1,000, we also have to pay the OEM vendor fee, which can be around $150. Furthermore, we are responsible for the payment of managed services, and occasionally there are additional charges for maintenance.

Which other solutions did I evaluate?

We considered several options, including Blue Prism, before choosing Automation Anywhere.

What other advice do I have?

I give Automation Anywhere a six out of ten.

When I joined my organization, we were using Automation Anywhere. Consequently, I am currently using it. However, all the features are also accessible through Microsoft Power Automate, which offers a free upgrade.

We attempted to train non-technical staff members for one month to utilize Automation Anywhere; however, learning proved to be quite challenging. As a result, we ultimately abandoned the endeavor and opted to hire a technical professional.

Automation Anywhere requires technical personnel who can write code to utilize the solution, making it challenging to integrate RPA bots, APIs, business applications, and documents. We are compelled to hire a vendor to write the code, which is not a practical approach.

I would recommend Microsoft Power Automate over Automation Anywhere because Automation Anywhere is excessively complex and challenging to use.

We have three users across three teams who utilize Automation Anywhere in our organization.

Automation Anywhere is self-maintained unless there is an error.

I advise exploring other options before settling for Automation Anywhere.