Gartner noted that one of the top strategic technology trends for 2021 is hyper automation. The sky-high, multi-billion dollar valuations of companies like UiPath and Automation Anywhere indicate the rising demand for RPA and evolving technologies.

Wayne Butterfield, Head of AI and Cognitive Automation Practice, ISG Automation, spoke at the 29th Nasscom Technology Leadership Forum (NTLF) on how organisations can prepare for this new wave in automation, and why its so critical in today’s rapidly evolving business landscape.

(Wayne Butterfield, Head of AI & Cognitive Automation Practice, ISG Automation)

After providing a quick microscopic study of the various elements of AI involved in automation, Butterfield moved on to the fundamentals of hyper automation, which include

• Process Discovery: This is the process of uncovering potential opportunities by data analysis, pattern recognition, process understanding and recognizing areas for improvisation, executed by communications mining, process mining, data analytics and process intelligence.
• Intelligent Process Automation: This involves providing structure to the unstructured, and allowing RPA to complete transactional activity in business applications. A host of mundane tasks can be easily achieved using OCR, RPA/RDA, NLP, cognitive reasoning and conversational AI.
• Business Benefit: This ultimately proves value creation enough to invite capital investment and facilitate more transactions between entities. This is further developed by communications mining, desktop analytics and process intelligence.

Hyper automation is rightly being reckoned as the future of automation because there are few functions in an organization it cannot apply to – it works for the back office, which is the structural core of the organization; middle office where program management functions are centred and even the front office, which is largely customer facing.

The future looks ‘smarter’, and a significant contribution will be made by AI and related technologies to make more data-driven decisions, enable the creation of new use cases for technology to solve and perhaps even pave the way for more digital office assistants that can integrate multiple functions seamlessly.

About Wayne Butterfield:

Wayne is an automation pioneer, thought leader and practitioner based in the UK. He heads up the AI & Cognitive Automation Practice for ISG Automation globally and is responsible for assisting ISG Automation clients on their journey towards AI, as well as hosting the weekly Bots & Beyond Podcast. He pioneered in the use of RPA and Chat Bots while at Telefonica O2, and has helped hundreds of Clients on their own automation journeys since joining ISG.