Robotic process automation gets sold to mid-size companies as the quick win. A bot logs into the same screens your staff use and clicks through them the way a person would, only faster. For a stable, rules-based task inside a system nobody can change, that works fine.
The trouble starts when a process runs across several tools that keep changing, or needs a bit of judgment along the way. At that point custom process automation, built on APIs and your own data instead of the user interface, usually costs less over a year than keeping the bots alive.
I’m CTO at udata, a software development company with 50+ engineers that builds automation systems and internal tools for growing businesses. Below is how we decide which approach fits, and what a custom build actually involves. [Read more…] about When RPA isn’t Enough: Custom Process Automation for Mid-Size Companies