Category Archives: Automation

Solutions Reviews listing of the best robotic process automation companies is an annual mashup of products that best represent current market conditions, according to the crowd. Our editors selected the best robotic process automation companies based on each vendors Authority Score; a meta-analysis of real user sentiment through the webs most trusted business software review sites and our own proprietary five-point inclusion criteria.

The editors at Solutions Review have developed this resource to assist buyers in search of the best robotic process automation companies to fit the needs of their organization. Choosing the right vendor and solution can be a complicated process one that requires in-depth research and often comes down to more than just the solution and its technical capabilities. To make your search a little easier, weve profiled the best robotic process automation companies all in one place. Weve also included platform and product line names and introductory software tutorials straight from the source so you can see each solution in action.

Note: Companies are listed in alphabetical order.

Platform:Appian RPA

Description:Appian RPA enables users to quickly build and deploy bots with visual, low-code design in a secure cloud environment. IT teams can centrally manage, monitor, and deploy Appian RPA, as well as third-party bots and end-to-end processes to increase scale and performance. Additionally, users can automate complex processes with case management capabilities that handle exceptions and ad-hoc activities. Appian RPA also allows users to orchestrate data, systems, and web services without complex coding. The provider was recently named a visionary in the 2021 Magic Quadrant for Robotic Process Automation.

Platform:Automation 360

Description:Automation 360 is a cloud-native and web-based automation platform that combines RPA, artificial intelligence, machine learning, and analytics. The provider also offers its Bot Store, which is the first and largest marketplace with more than 1,200 pre-built, intelligent automation solutions. Automation 360 automates business processes across all systems and applications, including SaaS and legacy applications. Additionally, the platform can transform every piece of structured and unstructured data in any document into a consumable digital asset through AI and ML with the IQ Bot.

Platform:Blue Prism

Description:Blue Prism offers a diverse product portfolio, which includes intelligent automation, robotic operating models, Blue Prism Cloud, automation lifecycle management, and a process assessment tool, among other tools. Blue Prisms intelligent automation platform is available for on-prem, public cloud, hybrid and multi-cloud environments, as well as SaaS deployments. The provider also partners with top-tier security technologies in order to guarantee system integrity with strict user access controls, multi-level change approvals, and a segregated interference-free processing environment.

Platform:TruBot

Description:Datamatics TruBot is a team of virtual assistants that automate repetitive and rule-based processes without any manual intervention. When powered with AI, it has the ability to recognize and replicate human actions, creating a more intelligent bot that can make informed decisions. The solution is sector agnostic and can be deployed across banking, healthcare, insurance, manufacturing, and logistics industries. TruBot also delivers enhanced security with privileged security access powered by CyberArk.

Platform:AssistEdge

Description:EdgeVerve Systems AssistEdge RPA platform is a good fit for major enterprise companies, especially those particularly reliant on consumer customer service. The solution is scalable and helps organizations modernize customer service, improve business processes, and enhance operational productivity. EdgeVerve also offers AssistEdge Discover, which tracks application usage and user activity on any device and identifies processes to be automated in order to improve productivity. Users can also speed up their business process automation capabilities with AssistEdge Cloud RPA.

Platform:Kofax RPA

Description:Kofax RPA integrates applications through any layer in the application stack; the presentation layer, database layer, or API layer. Users do not need any programming skills, access to complex APIs, or lengthy consulting projects when integrating with the platform. Additionally, Kofax RPA enables users to record, map, and analyze business processes and applications, including interactions through desktop and internal and external applications. This provides insight into existing processes and tasks that digital workers can automate. The solution also delivers robot lifecycle management and scalable deployment.

Platform:Laiye RPA

Description: With its advanced AI features, Laiye RPA can automate manual and repetitive tasks, which frees up staff to work on higher-value tasks. The platform comes with more than 400 pre-set commands that can be used for a variety of projects, including those with a series of complex processes. Laiye RPA Creator delivers production tools for RPA development with different views in local language, including visual view and code view to provide readability and efficiency. Additionally, Laiye RPA Commander enables users to log in and assign their own roles and operate with the resources in their group to control the entire automation process.

Platform:Microsoft Power Automate

Description:Microsoft Power Automate connects with other Microsoft products, enabling users to link new and legacy systems and take advantage of partner connectors. Microsoft also offers two modes for this platform: Attended RPA or Unattended RPA, which gives users the ability to decide how involved they want to be with their RPA processes. Microsoft Power Automate empowers all employees to analyze processes, understand bottlenecks, and gain insights through a guided Process Advisor feature.

Platform:NICE Robotic Process Automation

Description:NICE Robotic Process Automation is comprised of software robots with the ability to automate end-to-end processes in an unattended manner, or directly support employees from their desktop in an attended fashion. NICEs Automation Finder feature for process mining is included with the attended solution, NEVA. NEVA works side-by-side with employees from any location, guiding them through complex processes. This technology leverages Desktop Analytics and machine learning to accurately pinpoint which business processes should be automated. NICE RPA also increases throughput capacity, enabling businesses to achieve ROI targets faster.

Platform:Pega Robotic Process Automation

Description:As part of the Pega Platform, Pega Robotic Process Automation delivers a range of capabilities. The solution offers Pega RPA Auto-balancing, a feature designed to ensure that a users investment in process automation is yielding positive results. Additionally, the Pega Email Bot utilizes natural language processing (NLP) and artificial intelligence to automatically triage, route, and respond to emails, giving employees time to focus on other tasks. The platforms Workforce Intelligence tool also makes use of AI to determine where and when to automate for optimal impact.

Platform:UiPath RPA Platform

Description:The UiPath RPA Platform gives anyone in an organization the ability to build and use robots. Developers with more experience can use a rich development environment with Studio, while citizen developers can automate simple, day-to-day tasks for themselves and their team with StudioX. UiPath also enables users to test any and all of their processes with the platforms Test Suite. Additionally, the vendor offers a range of ways for staff to engage with bots through Action Center, UiPath Assistant, and Chatbots. Users can also create and manage governance policies with Automation Ops.

Platform:WorkFusion Intelligent Automation Cloud

Description:WorkFusion Intelligent Automation Cloud brings together the technology needed to implement intelligent automation at scale in a unified platform that can be deployed quickly without the need for third-party tools, data scientists, or custom coding. The platform also offers intelligent, pre-trained bots that organizations can additionally train on their custom data. The bots can also understand complex documents with unstructured data to digitize, classify, make decisions, and extract data. The bots learn with each new document and example, thereby continuously increasing the level of automation.

Editor at Solutions Review

Tess Hanna is an editor and writer at Solutions Review covering Backup and Disaster Recovery, Data Storage, Business Process Management, and Talent Management. Recognized by Onalytica in the 2021 "Who's Who in Data Management." You can contact her at thanna@solutionsreview.com

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The Best Robotic Process Automation Companies to Consider for 2021 and Beyond - Solutions Review

Two common asset management metrics whose relevance has grown in importance even as new analytic technologies such as predictive maintenance have emerged are mean time to repair (MTTR) and mean time before failure (MTBF). Though these metrics have been used widely for years, they dont always get the attention they deserve, which has led to some confusion among end users about how to properly calculate them and apply their results.

Automation World connected with Sam Russem, senior director of smart manufacturing solutions at Grantek, a system integration and engineering services company, to learn more about MTTR and MTBF for a recent episode of the Automation World Gets Your Questions Answered podcast series.

Defining the termsStarting our discussion with a focus on MTTR, Russem said, It is essentially the average time it takes to get an asset back up and running once it's gone down. So, if your case packer goes down at noon, and you get it back up and running at 12:30, that took 30 minutes to repair. That's your time to repair. Then, when you average those downtime periods together over a certain time span, thats your mean time to repair over that period of time.

In terms of MTTRs application, Russem explained that, if the MTTR on most of your assets is in the 10 to 20 minute range, but one key piece of equipment has an MTTR measured in hours or days, this kind of insight can help to prioritize your maintenance schedule and keep production running.

Sam Russem, senior director of smart manufacturing solutions at Grantek.Another common use of MTTR is to evaluate maintenance teams, or even maintenance individuals. Maintenance always wants to be driving MTTR down because that means they're getting things back up and running quicker in the event of a downtime. But if you look into the data, and you realize that a certain maintenance technician consistently has a lower MTTR than another technician, this can be a training opportunity to spread that workers knowledge around. It can also tell you a lot about how your maintenance team has performed.

Russem said that MTBF is much like MTTR in that they both focus on the length of specific downtime events for a piece of equipment. The primary difference is that MTBF is much more of an indicator of your machine and asset performance than it is a personnel assessment, he said.

Its a really interesting metric to examine over time because, if you have an asset with an MTBF of 30 days and that figure drops to 28 days, then 25 and continues to fail, that indicates the asset is due for maintenance or some other type of remediation to get it to fail less frequently.

Maintenance benefitsBeyond the application of MTTR and MTBF to evaluate maintenance teams and asset performance, these metrics can also be used to track repair rates not just by asset, but by specific fault code on that asset. This can help further prioritize maintenance activities and organize the maintenance teams schedule, said Russem.

If a specific machine is showing a in-feed jam fault, and we know it usually takes 15 minutes to repair, that can really help your maintenance team organize their scheduling, he said. On the operations side, think about how MTTR ties into operationally focused metrics. For example, if you are improving your MTTR, you should see that reflected in a higher asset availability and a higher OEE (overall equipment effectiveness) score.

Your OEE system could be pulling data directly from PLCs, whereas your CMMS is likely tied to maintenance logs. Then, when operators or maintenance personnel log data into one of these systems, discrepancies between how those two different systems are reporting can highlight information about how well your operations and maintenance are in sync, or not.

MTBF can also be used to identify opportunities for planned downtime. For example, if a machine is failing every two weeks, and there's a planned downtime for preventative maintenance on that machine, that can indicate opportunities to bring those MTBF numbers up a little bit higher and keep things running longer, said Russem. On the operations side, lower MTBF numbers mean that production assets are failing more frequently and hurting overall productivity. In other words, there are some situations where operators could directly influence MTBF time; for example, if you have an operator who knows how to tweak machine parameters to increase throughput. But that may be decreasing MTBF by making the line go down more often and causing overall productivity to decrease. Thats why MTBF is one of those numbers that can help you understand and balance the overall effectiveness of a line and its influence on overall throughput.

Metric calculationFortunately, MTBF and MTTR are fairly simple to calculate. As Russem noted, all you really need to calculate these metrics is to know when your assets are down and when they're back up.

As long as you have those pieces of information, you can calculate MTTR and MTBF, which is why there are many pieces of softwarelike OEE and CMMS (computerized maintenance management systems)that can do these calculations based on maintenance and operator logs, said Russem. But it doesn't mean, if you don't have one of those systems, that you can't get this information yourself. As long you have that asset availability information, youre just one Excel sheet and a quick calculation away from figuring out and tracking these numbers.

Essentially, any software connected to your machine data or receiving operator or maintenance log information is capable of helping you obtain these metrics.

Using CMMS and OEE software to calculate MTTR and MTBF can also help you zero in on more difficult-to-determine operational insights. Russem noted that MTTR and MTBF can become more interesting when numbers [from different software systems] don't match up. For example, your OEE system could be pulling data directly from PLCs, whereas your CMMS is likely tied to maintenance logs. Then, when operators or maintenance personnel log data into one of these systems, discrepancies between how those two different systems are reporting can highlight information about how well your operations and maintenance are in sync, or not.

Originally posted here:

Understanding MTTR and MTBF Maintenance Metrics - Automation World

60% of hospitals and health systems that adopt lean principles also use automation; larger organizations report highest use of automation efforts

SOUTH SAN FRANCISCO, Calif., Sept. 9, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- AKASA, the only Unified Automation company for healthcare revenue cycle management, released findings from a new survey, highlighting how hospitals and health systems that embrace lean principles also often include automation as a strategy to achieve success. Nearly 70% of hospitals and health systems reported using lean principles for business process improvement and more than 60% of those respondents also say they employ automation within the revenue cycle to reduce waste and improve efficiency.

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"We are seeing that for organizations actively employing lean management principles, leaders quickly recognize the value of automation within the revenue cycle and conversion to automation happens swiftly especially for larger organizations with more overhead," said Amy Raymond, head of revenue cycle operations at AKASA. "Revenue cycle automation reduces variation and increases productivity key tenets within the lean principles. Automation can also serve to expand revenue capture, accelerate cash collections, improve clean claims rates, increase first pass-payments and decrease the overall cost to collect."

Commissioned by AKASA, the survey fielded responses from nearly 400 chief financial officers and revenue cycle leaders at hospitals and health systems across the United States through the Healthcare Financial Management Association's (HFMA) Pulse Survey program between May 27, 2021 and June 28, 2021. The national survey was designed to assess the adoption of automation in revenue cycle operations at hospitals and health systems across the U.S.

About AKASAAKASA is building the future of healthcare with AI. The only Unified Automation company for healthcare, AKASA uses the same machine learning approaches that made driverless cars possible to provide health systems with a single solution for automating revenue cycle operations. AKASA's unique expert-in-the-loop approach, Unified Automation, combines modern machine-learning with human judgment and subject matter expertise to provide robust and resilient automation. Unified Automation adapts to the highly dynamic nature of revenue cycle operations and has been purpose-built for healthcare. AKASA enables health systems to decrease their cost to collect so they can invest more in patient care and be better stewards of the healthcare dollar. AKASA is based in the heart of Silicon Valley and we're hiring. Learn more at http://www.AKASA.com.

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SOURCE AKASA

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Majority of Health Systems That Leverage Lean Principles Use Automation as Part of Process Improvement - Yahoo Finance

Do we need humans for that job? What about Automation? Those are questions a lot of businesses are asking right now.

Service sector jobs once considered safe are no longer. In Dallas, a restaurant/bakery is now using robots to deliver food and drinks to tables, and it even talks.

As crazy as it sounds, business owners are thinking about all their options in light of the pandemic.

The U.S. economy has been moving in that way since we began with automation more than a hundred years ago, University of Houston Economist Ed Hirs said. Every dollar you save on labor is something we can offset with capital. Its a trade.

Hirs also believes some workers are waiting, to see where they fit in a post-pandemic job market. Supply chain interruptions have made it difficult for some to return to their old job. The U.S. Labor Department says there are almost 11 million job openings nationwide, but lots of them remain unfilled.

Part of its a shift. Part of it is the population really coming to terms with trying to get back to work and not really being sure about how to go about doing it, he explained.

Hirs says it remains to be seen if the recent expiration of government COVID handouts will lead to more Americans looking for work.

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What About A Robot? Businesses Turning To Automation Post Pandemic | NewsRadio 740 KTRH - NewsRadio 740 KTRH

Joint alliance to augment general aviation pilot safety

Becker Avionics, a 65-year globally-renowned aviation industry supplier that works with the top 20 Aerospace OEMs, and commercial drone safety innovator,Iris Automation, have entered into a strategic partnership to increase the situational awareness of general aviation pilots and advance uncrewed aerial vehicle (UAV) safety. The two companies will jointly develop a non-required safety-enhancing equipment system to detect and warn pilots of nearby, potentially threatening aircraft.

The Iris Automation and Becker Avionics collision avoidance safety system will use computer vision and machine learning to see when another aircraft is approaching from outside the pilots field of view, and poses a risk to the equipped aircraft, issuing 3D audio warnings. The solution will combine Iris Automations patentedCasia detect and alert technologywith Becker Avionics communication and navigation equipment expertise for both crewed and uncrewed airborne applications.

Many aircraft are equipped with radio-based signalling technology (ADS-B) to avoid mid-air collisions. But in some airspace, traditional ADS-B signals are not available, increasing the workload on a pilot to monitor for incoming aircraft. According to the Bureau of Transportation Statistics, 1450 near mid-air collisions were reported from 2016-2020. Eighty-two percent of mid-air collisions occur from the rear, states the AOPA Air Safety Foundation (ASF). This risk is especially acute for the $48B helicopter market, with over 38,000 aircraft in service worldwide.

The Iris Automation/Becker Avionics opto-electric/audio system will monitor airspace in visual flight conditions independently, onboard the pilots aircraft, even if ADS-B or TCAS signals may be unavailable. It supplements pilots situational awareness, whether in the cockpit or remote, during instrument scans or other parts of the airspace. By providing warnings in time to take appropriate actions to avoid potential collisions, the system is designed to improve safety with minimal impact on pilot workload.

Roland Becker, Chairman of Becker Avionics

Becker Avionics has provided reliable aviation equipment for 65 years, enabling regulatory compliance and aviator safety. Partnering with an innovator like Iris Automation will allow our customers to exploit advanced technology to fly safer, especially as airspace congestion increases. Client interest in this kind of solution is very high, and our ability to service both their cockpit and remote pilot safety needs is unique in the industry.

Jon Damush, CEO of Iris Automation

This relationship is a pivotal move for Iris Automation as it defines and accelerates our work in the general aviation space. Our core mission is to improve air safety by avoiding collisions and this extension of our technology is a natural evolution. We are excited to be able to work with one of the most storied brands in the industry to deliver this important innovation.

About Becker Avionics

Becker Avionics is a renowned manufacturer in digital avionics technology, setting the standard in customer-oriented, state-of-the-art ground and airborne solutions. Beckers focus is on meeting individual requirements with the highest commitment to quality and customer satisfaction, no matter what the mission. As a privately held high-tech company for 65 years, Becker Avionics has developed, manufactured and distributed the latest communication, navigation, surveillance, digital audio, and search & rescue equipment for airborne and ground applications world-wide. Becker has proudly provided world class products for General Aviation, ATC, law enforcement, military and OEM organizations including:

Airbus, Airbus Helicopters, Bell Helicopter, BAE Systems (British Aerospace), ATR, CASA, RUAG, Xian Aircraft Corporation, HAL, Leonardo Helicopter, Pilatus Aircraft, German Armed Forces, German Border Patrol, German Federal and State Police, Austrian Army and Police, Swiss Air Force, Dutch Police, Security Civil, Irish Air Corps, Egyptian Navy, Indonesian Navy, Portuguese Air Force, U.S. Army, U.S. Air Force, U.S. Navy and U.S. Auxiliary Civil Air Patrol, etc. For more information visit:www.becker-avionics.com

About Iris Automation

Iris Automation is a safety avionics technology company pioneering on- and off-board perception systems and aviation policy services that enable customers to build scalable operations for crewed and uncrewed aircraft; unlocking the potential of countless industries. Iris Casia system runs either onboard the aircraft or in a ground-based configuration. We work closely with civil aviation authorities globally as they implement regulatory frameworks ensuring BVLOS is conducted safely, partnering on multiple FAA ASSURE and BEYOND UAS Integration Programs and Transport Canadas BVLOS Technology Demonstration Program.Visitwww.irisonboard.com.

Originally posted here:

Renowned Aviation Supplier Becker Avionics Partners with Iris Automation - sUAS News

General Motors siblings BrightDrop and Cruise Automation are talking about how driverless technology could fit with commercial vehicles like the electric vans BrightDrop will begin delivering to FedEx in December.

Cruise is starting on ride-share, but they have investment from Walmart, BrightDrop CEO Travis Katz told FreightWaves in an interview at the Advanced Clean Transportation Expo last week in Long Beach, California.

Walmart is in the delivery business so you can imagine their ideas there, and were in the delivery business. So I think what weve really started to talk about with the Cruise guys is what does the future of delivery look like and whats the rule for autonomy?

How the two would work together is the unanswered question. But coming out of GM, scaling a business would be easier than for a smaller company working solo.

Theres a lot of problems still to be solved, Katz zaid. How do you really make this customer-centric and customer friendly? And how do you make it really seamless from the warehouse all the way to the front door?

Before anything happens with Cruise, BrightDrop has to deliver the first tranche of 500 Class 3 EV600 electric vans and an electronically driven EP1 cargo box to FedEx Express in December. The vans are being built in Ingersoll, Ontario, the former assembly plant of the Chevrolet Equinox SUV.

GM announced BrightDrop virtually during the Consumer Electronics Show in January.

Like its parent company, BrightDrop has been affected by a shortage of microchips critical to automobile and commercial vehicles. But Katz said production is still running to target. GMs supply chain expertise makes a huge difference.

I dont know if youre a new company getting off the ground and you arent buying hundreds of millions of parts how you have the leverage, Katz said. I wont say its not challenging for everyone, including GM. Its challenging, but I think were well positioned to manage our way through it.

The EV600 enters a segment with multiple big players, including Ford Motor Co.s E-Transit electric van, Amazon-backed startup battery-electric Rivian and Workhorse Group, which is delivering small numbers of its C-1000 electric cargo van.

During a panel discussion at the ACT Expo, Katz said the EV600 would save the average fleet operator $7,000 a year versus a diesel-powered van.

The amount of inbound demand were seeing for these vehicles is incredible, Katz said. It actually took everyone by surprise just how much demand there is, and [it has] caused us to rethink a little bit our manufacturing plans to make sure that we were ready and scaled to meet the demand.

But he is silent beyond two customer announcements to date the 500 EV600s to FedEx and the intent by fleet management company Merchants Fleet to take 12,600 of the battery-powered vans by 2023.

A lot of companies have got out over their skis a little bit, talking probably too publicly about things that they probably should not be talking about. Weve got super-exciting things I would love to be able to share. Were not going to share them until we can share them in a way thats really concrete.

A lot of companies have got out over their skis a little bit, talking probably too publicly about things that they probably should not be talking about, Katz said. Weve got super-exciting things I would love to be able to share. Were not going to share them until we can share them in a way thats really concrete.

Thats either the typically conservative GM approach or wisdom taken from the experience of companies like electric pickup truck startup Lordstown Motors, which is under Justice Department and Securities and Exchange Commission scrutiny for allegedly inflating orders.

GM has a full-size van, sold as the Chevrolet Express and GMC Savana, that serves a certain portion of the van market plumbers, electricians and other skilled trades. The EV600 complements those vehicles but borrows little from other legacy GM vehicles, save for a few components.

The [EV600] itself is designed from the ground up for delivery, he said, mentioning a low step-in height. These guys get in and out of vans 150 times a day, so their knees wear out if youre stepping high.

The EV600 uses the Ultium battery platform and borrows from the battery-electric Hummer, now sold as a GMC model after being introduced in the early 2000s as a stand-alone brand. The electric van development time broke the Hummers record for speed to market.

We were able to go even faster because were able to leverage a lot of what theyre doing, Katz said.

BrightDrop is as much a software enterprise as it is a van manufacturer.

All of our products are connected internet of things devices that allow fleet operators to have visibility, control and insights about whats happening with their fleets in real time, Katz said. You can start to have real-time chain of custody, where it is in the delivery stage, how many touches it has had and who actually touched it.

On charging, which is critical to up time for electric vehicles, BrightDrop is working with the GM Fleet organization to leverage a collaboration called Ultium 360, which includes infrastructure providers EVGo, In-Charge, Schneider Electric and Duke Energy.

The idea is that were partnering with these companies to make this transition seamless and easy. So we are going to be bringing in these partners early on in the conversations with customers, Katz said.

The EV600 is only part of what BrightDrop considers an ecosystem around first-to-last-mile delivery. Katz wont discuss the take rate for the EP1 among those interested in the van, but he said it is significant.

When you talk to companies that are doing last-mile delivery, the growth in e-commerce is breaking their model, and so they need a lot of help, he said.

We literally had our design team riding around on delivery routes with drivers to study everything: the ergonomics, where are they staging their package before they jump off, how are they getting in? I think that focus on this use case of delivery is something that Im not sure anyone else has done before.

GM to bring electric cargo van, medium-duty truck to market

GM bets on BrightDrops connected last-mile delivery ecosystem

Merchants Fleet orders 12,600 GM BrightDrop electric vans

Click for more FreightWaves articles by Alan Adler.

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GM siblings BrightDrop and Cruise Automation talking about driverless delivery - FreightWaves

SAN JOSE, Calif. & HYDERABAD, India--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Analytics Insight has announced 'The 10 Most Innovative Intelligent Automation Solution Providers in 2021 in its August-September magazine issue.

The magazine recognizes ten trailblazing intelligent automation providers who are using technology to accomplish a wide array of workplace routines. By automating previously time-consuming and largely manual tasks, these companies help employees to focus on higher-value work. They avail organizations to achieve intelligent automation faster and assist them to make more insightful decisions. These companies are redefining automation and breaking new targets of quality, efficiency, and flexibility. Here is the list of the top ten innovative intelligent automation providers that made the list in 2021.

Featuring as the Cover Story is Quale Infotech, a leading end-to-end IT consulting and implementation company, with a laser focus on Robotic Process Automation (RPA) and Artificial Intelligence (AI). Quale started with a vision to be a customer-oriented digital services firm. The company has adhered to that aim and strived to be the partner of choice for its customers.

The issue features Nine A Business Connect and Botminds as the Companies of the Month.

Nine A Business Connect (9A): Nine A Business Connect uses technology to simplify business, create long-term value, and enable connected life. The company helps organizations in digital transformation with an immersive experience. 9A has been providing efficient technology solutions to solve real-world problems of enterprise customers while encouraging innovation.

Botminds: Botminds is a revolutionary intelligent document process automation platform that allows enterprises to liberate their employees from tedious tasks like reading documents and extracting information from them. Botminds is the worlds first unified no-code intelligent document processing (IDP) and process automation (IPA) platform.

Other honourable companies include:

Excelledia Ventures: Excelledia Ventures supports businesses of all sizes and ambitious founders, who push the edge of what is possible. The company aids organizations and leaders with their expertise and drives them to tackle major global issues.

Grooper: Grooper was built in 2015 from the ground up by BIS, a company with 35 years of continuous experience in developing and delivering document automation technology. Grooper is an intelligent document processing and digital data integration solution.

Kenmei: Kenmei is a European company founded by telecom and software experts, specialized in data analysis and mobile network automation through artificial intelligence. The company is known for its ADELE solution, which stands for Autonomous Decisions and Learning.

Roots Automation: Roots Automation is a Digital Coworkers-as-a-Service company, offering pre-trained bots or Digital Coworkers. These bots come pre-programmed with the knowledge, skills, and experience required to perform a variety of roles.

Santa Marta AB: Santa Marta AB is a Swedish company created in 2020 to provide business process automation from the cloud. The companys main product, Laura, digitizes any process by flexibly communicating with other applications and human beings.

Syntiant: Syntiant is enabling customized voice experiences at the edge, across multiple products and use cases including wake word, command control, and event detection, free from cloud connectivity, ensuring privacy and security.

V2R Limited: V2R Limited is a financial services company that provides financial accounting, accounts payable, accounts receivable, procurement processes, management accounting, and program project services. The company utilizes specialist skills to reduce the delivery costs, etc.

Intelligent automation is becoming a big part of our work routine, streamlining tasks at greater speed and scaling whats humanly possible. In this issue, Analytics Insight aims to recognize and celebrate intelligent automation solution providers that are helping the world deliver cognition similar to the human brain, says Adilin Beatrice, Senior Analyst at Analytics Insight.

Read the detailed coverage here. For more information, please visit https://www.analyticsinsight.net/.

About Analytics Insight

Analytics Insight is an influential platform dedicated to insights, trends, and opinions from the world of data-driven technologies. It monitors developments, recognition, and achievements made by AI, big data, and analytics companies across the globe. The Analytics Insight Magazine features opinions and views from top leaders and executives in the industry who share their journey, experiences, success stories, and knowledge to grow profitable businesses.

To set up an interview or advertise your brand, contact info@analyticsinsight.net

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Analytics Insight Announces 'The 10 Most Innovative Intelligent Automation Solution Providers in 2021' - Business Wire

In this article, well cover how you can automate role-based access control (RBAC) assignments in ShiftLeft CORE. You can sign up for a free ShiftLeft CORE account and try this out for yourself.

ShiftLeft COREs role-based access control (RBAC) feature allows you to manage applications, teams, and roles via its API. This is helpful for administrators overseeing multiple teams, each with developers working on different projects, since they no longer have to manage access control on a per-developer basis. Here is a link to our RBAC documentation.

From my experience as a Customer Success Engineer, many people want to apply RBAC to their applications security findings. Forexample:

Managing these different needs, however, can be challenging.

When you have a variety of roles, each requiring a specific set of permissions, role-based access control is useful. RBAC allows organizations to roll out users, groups, and teams in bulk while ensuring that each person has the permissions they need (and nothingmore).

In addition to UI-based management, COREs role-based access control (RBAC) feature allows the management of applications, teams, and roles via its API. This is helpful for administrators overseeing multiple teams, each with developers working on different projects, since they no longer have to manage access control on a per-developer basis.

However, I thought this process could be simpler. To that end, I created a script that automates several processes related to role-based access control. The script performs a bulk operation using a CSV file of users, teams, organizations roles, and team roles, updating the ShiftLeft users as specified. With this script, organizations can easily map users, roles, and teams in bulk. The API documentation can be foundhere.

The RBAC automation script is available on Github; you may find it helpful to refer to the repo during the subsequent portions of this article, which explain how the scriptworks.

To run the automation script, you will need both your ShiftLeft Access Token (this is your Personal Access Token, not your CI Token) and your Organization ID.

The script accepts a CSV file as an input (note that the inputs are case-sensitive). Each row in the filedefines:

The script works by searching for each user in ShiftLeft, then updating their team, organization role, and team role as defined in the CSV (if the team to which they should be assigned does not exist, ShiftLeft will createit).

Its important to note, however, that the users being updated should already be verified users, either through an email invite or from just-in-time SSO provisioning (seats are limited in this case, however).

Finally, to use the script, run python3 main.py in the terminal from the root of the directory where you have saved thescript.

RBAC is helpful for management access control en masse, but ShiftLefts API allows you to take advantage of automation to make management easier while minimizing the potential to make mistakes during the assignment process.

If you are interested in learning more about RBAC implementation at ShiftLeft please check out thisarticle.

You can sign up for a free ShiftLeft CORE account and try this out for yourself.

Automating Role-Based Access Control Assignments in ShiftLeft CORE was originally published in ShiftLeft Blog on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

*** This is a Security Bloggers Network syndicated blog from ShiftLeft Blog - Medium authored by Davis Barillas. Read the original post at: https://blog.shiftleft.io/automating-role-based-access-control-assignments-in-shiftleft-core-aea776f23543?source=rss----86a4f941c7da---4

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Automating Role-Based Access Control Assignments in ShiftLeft CORE - Security Boulevard

Workday today revealed its acquisition of Zimit, which extends its Professional Services Automation (PSA) offering with a Configure-Price-Quote (CPQ) engine specifically designed for services companies. Zimit was already a Workday Ventures portfolio company and there is an existing Workday-approved integration between the two companies' products. Terms of the deal were not disclosed and the transaction is expected to close in the next few weeks.

Zimit fills a gap in the CPQ market, which in the main serves companies who sell complex product SKUs with many different configuration options. These mainstream CPQ offerings don't cater for the needs of services-centric companies, whose quotations and contracts comprise a range of elements that you wouldn't find in a typical product quote, such as resources, skills, hours, timelines, stages and tasks. Zimit provides an online process, based on a solution catalog, guided selling and a pricing engine, which automatically produces a quote and ultimately a Statement of Work that defines the project or service to be delivered. Like other CPQ products, it has a certified integration with Salesforce, which many customers take advantage of.

Companies typically implement Zimit to replace time-consuming and error-prone workarounds based on spreadsheets and shared documents, resulting in improved responsiveness, significant time savings and better resource utilization. According to Pete Schlampp, EVP of Product Development at Workday:

Zimit ... is one of the first and only companies to provide services quotes in a matter of minutes.

Bringing Zimit into the Workday community is a natural fit and aligns with our mutual goal to automate complex finance processes.

The existing integration transfers the details from the Zimit quotation or SOW into Workday PSA to create the customer contract and project details. After the acquisition closes, the intention is to broaden the scope of this process to provide an end-to-end, quote-to-cash cycle that is applicable across a broad range of services industries. According to the release:

With Zimit, Workday will provide organizations with a comprehensive quote-to-cash process automation offering for services industries, including communications, media, technology, and professional and business services. The combination will provide organizations increased visibility across the entire revenue cycle and will help further expand the Workday product portfolio that is enabling the office of the CFO to digitally transform.

Back in March, Zimit CEO James Cramer spoke to analysts at a Workday Ventures briefing. Founded in 2015, the company had posted "100 to 200% growth over the last couple years" he said. It sees demand from three main categories of business.

The first are traditional professional services companies, such as existing customers Workday implementation partner Alight and marketing services giant WPP. One of the big opportunities here in partnering with Workday is to connect information from quotes and SOWs into Workday's finance and HCM systems to help plan resource demand. Cramer explained:

Companies that are selling $500 million a year in services would really like to be able to forecast resource demand. That's a really challenging problem, when all of those quotes are being done in spreadsheets, it's a very difficult problem to solve.

The second category are professional services organizations within product companies, such as Dell Technologies and Workday itself among Zimit's current customers. Increasingly these companies need to quote for services alongside products, and need to do so in an integrated manner. Workday is a case in point, as Cramer explained:

Workday has a large, very robust services business, which is everything from implementation services in the classic sense, but it also includes learning services, it includes packaged integrations, it includes optimization services. They have something called prime where the other implementers are doing the work, but Workday is still involved sometimes they're charging for that and sometimes they're not. All of that is currently live, connected bidirectionally with Salesforce.

The final category is the Everything-as-a-Service (XaaS) trend, where businesses are taking traditional products, services and experiences, and turning them into an ongoing service that is billed on a pay-as-you-go basis. Again, the mechanisms for quoting this type of offering are quite different from a traditional CPQ tool they may have used in the past. Cramer spoke about Cyracom, a translation service provider specializing in the healthcare industry, whose pricing is based on consumption:

As [Cyracom] provides a whole range of translation services written, verbal, all sorts of stuff, which they monitor they feed us that data. We price that data, we price that consumption, and hand it off to Workday, so Workday can invoice that and send it out to the customer.

Across all three areas, putting quotations into a fully digital system opens up the potential for companies to test new offerings, price breaks and other innovations. Cramer explained:

Some of our customers, now that they've replaced spreadsheets, and they've evolved their capabilities, in terms of how to quote services to begin with, what we're starting to have conversations [about] is, 'What should the price of the service be? Could my service change based on the demand? Could it be based different on consumption? Could it be based different as a function of volume? Could it be different based on region, or the combination of services?' All of those types of optimizations, customers are really looking into.

Zimit also has an integration with FinancialForce, which targets similar opportunities as the Workday relationship. However FinancialForce in June this year announced a new function of its own to provide service estimation, so is no longerdependent on the Zimit partnership for that capability. Workday has not said whether Zimit will continue to partner with FinancialForce after the deal closes. A FinancialForce spokesperson provided the following statement:

FinancialForce sees strong demand from our customers todeliver services estimating onthe Salesforce Platform, to keep opportunity to project deliveryall on one platform that connects CPQ, CRM, and PSA for a seamless experience for our customers. Thus we announced our own services estimating capability in June. We believe the right strategy isaconnectedmodel:once you put another solution in the middle, you create data, consistency, integration, and lifecycle issues for customers.

This is an interesting expansion of Workday's PSA offering and continues to extend its portfolio of offerings that complement its core finance and HCM applications. It's also in line with the strategy of deepening its offering to specific industry verticals. It's also likely to be an astute move, given the trend towards XaaS that diginomica has frequently called out. As Brian Sommer wrote earlier this year when examining the services CPQ market and Zimit's offering, this is a 'white space' opportunity where no automation currently exists in most companies.

[Updated early on September 9th to add comment from FinancialForce.]

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Workday acquires Zimit to bring CPQ automation to the services industry - Diginomica

Automation is an essential technology tool for producers. Still, adoption is often lagging because of concerns over lead times, costs, and deployment. A phased approach to automation is a new path for companies to consider. Discussing the subject, On the Case host, Tyler Kern spoke with Todd Davis, Manager, and John Hodge, Sales Engineer, of INSITE Packaging Automation.

Davis believed there were many benefits to a phased approach to automation by taking things step-by-step. You dont have to dive right in; you can, in a sense, wade into it, Davis said. This style of approach may help companies better manage their resources, especially in times of resource shortages.

A phased approach drives many other benefits, including shorter lead times, more flexibility, ease in scalability, and a reduced learning curve.

Hodge spoke on the experience INSITE Packaging Automation can bring to this phased approach. With INSITE and Douglas, you have access to a whole line of automation alternatives, Hodge said. Some of those alternatives when you come to INSITE and Douglas collectively are erectors, sealers, hand-packed stations, integration, stand-alone case packers, all the way up to fully integrated case packers.

And the combination of INSITE and Douglas provides over sixty years of experience in helping CPG companies successfully automate.

We have the knowledge and the skill-set to help you succeed when it comes to the phased approach, Hodge said.

And when the time comes, Davis added, for the need for our customers to grow, we have that ability through a phased approach to an automation mindset that were there to support them through every step of the way to get to that next level.

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On the Case: Phased Approach to Automation - MarketScale