RPA sales are down significantly year-over-year, but remain strong, indicating the emergence of “hyper-automation”.
Although down significantly from 2021 figures, robotic process automation (RPA) software sales are expected to reach $2.9 billion by the end of 2022, according to Gartner. This is a 19.5% increase from 2021.
“Reaching a growth rate of 31% in 2021, the RPA market has grown well above the average global software market growth rate of 16%,” said Cathy Tornbohm, Eminent Vice President and Analyst at Gartner, in a press release. “Organizations are leveraging RPA to accelerate business process automation initiatives and digital transformation plans…to improve operational efficiency.”
Gartner expects global RPA software sales to grow 17.5% year-over-year through 2023.
What is RPA and where is it best used?
RPA is a human emulation technology that allows a user to create scripts (usually called bots) to automate specific keystrokes and actions, Gartner said. RPA mimics transaction steps within a process or workflow, including manipulating data, transmitting data to and from applications, triggering responses, and/or executing transactions . RPA relies on a combination of user interface interactions and descriptor technologies that overlay one or more applications.
RPA and other intelligent automation technologies rely heavily on AI, said Varsha Mehta, senior market researcher at Gartner.
“AI is a hugely important component of intelligent automation because it helps in making data-driven decisions and through machine learning it can start extracting and categorizing emails, customer applications that include structured and unstructured text for example,” she said. “AI is the fundamental core of these listed technologies/capabilities.”
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Why Business Leaders Should Consider Using an RPA
Because of the business benefits, including streamlining business processes and productivity gains, organizations should increase the adoption of RPA with the goal of automating repetitive manual tasks, Gartner said. The goal is to free up employees for more strategic and value-added work.
“Technologies such as RPA can be used to combine multiple types of interaction with user interface interaction to complete a process flow that requires, for example, manipulation of data from the Internet, in mainframes and on client servers,” Mehta said. “For example, when new regulations are introduced such as personal protection plans, that means a lot of data is being combined and put together and that would have required banks to hire a lot of new people to do that work.”
RPA vendors are also expanding to offer a suite of tools that encompasses low-code application platforms, process mining, task mining, decision modeling, iPaaS, computer and intelligent document processing capabilities.
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Hyper-Automation Factors in RPA Growth
Hyper-automation is a disciplined, business-driven approach that organizations use to quickly identify, verify and automate as many business and IT processes as possible, Mehta said. Hyper-automation involves the orchestrated use of multiple technologies, tools, or platforms, including but not limited to AI, ML, event-driven software architecture, RPA, integration platform as a service, intelligent business process management, low-code/no-code, process mining, task mining, IDP, packaged software and other types of decision and process automation tools. tasks.
Gartner predicts that by 2025, the market for software enabling hyper-automation will reach nearly $860 billion. The demand for hyper-automation is driven by a strong need for digital transformation and automation of business and IT processes.
Most RPA sales are expected to take place in North America, Western Europe and Japan, which together account for 77% of RPA revenue in 2022. North America accounts for the largest revenue share at 48.5% , followed by Western Europe and Japan with 19% and 10%, respectively.
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