Spending on automation and AI business operations worldwide 2016-2023, by segment

In 2021, it is estimated that 10.9 billion U.S. dollars will be spent on intelligent process automation (IPA). While in that same year, robotic process automation (RPA) and artificial intelligence (AI) business operations are expected to have less spending overall with 5.4 and 4 billion U.S. dollars, respectively. However, by 2023, RPA and AI business operations are expected to gain significant traction.

Differences between RPA, IPA, and AI operations

Each of these digitalized processes are relatively similar, however, they each have different functions. Robotic process automation (RPA) examines large volumes of data from software processes and translates them to potential triggers for new actions, responses, and communication with other systems. RPA is typically associated with software robots or “bots” that handle repetitive rule-based digital tasks. On the other hand, intelligent process automation (IPA) allows for business functions that are automatically enabled, that allows the robots to learn from performing their tasks. IPA is therefore, more “smart” and more flexible since it is not rule-driven. The “smartest” of these is artificial intelligence (AI) operations. AI operations simulates human thought processes across the enterprise operations, without manual intervention like with RPA and IPA, and involves self-learning systems more advanced than IPA.

Impact on workforce

Each of these technologies have the potential to impact the human workforce in various industries, displacing many from their previous roles. For example, startups such as UiPath are using RPA to take over repetitive and routine data entry and basic processing tasks, especially in the healthcare industry. The main strategy to combat the displaced workforce from the intelligent automation technology deployment is retraining the employees to work on new business needs that are beyond the scope of the automation and AI business operations. This could be anything from exception handling to perhaps more customer-facing roles.