Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) systems have emerged as increasingly powerful tools for orchestrating business processes across various functions at scale. The birth of cloud-based ERP only cemented its criticality in the enterprise technology stack.
Since ERPs drive some of the most critical processes within finance, accounting, procurement, manufacturing, and supply chain, automation is one of the most powerful levers to maximize process efficiency at scale.
However, approaches to ERP automation have evolved significantly over the last decade. While some challenges remain, innovations in Cloud ERP solutions are rewriting the art of the possible in enterprise automation. Read the article to learn about the key trends driving this shift and how they are rewriting strategies for competing in this changing ERP landscape.
Enterprise Automation: Then and Now
Early attempts at ERP automation began with Robotic Process Automation (RPA) tools. Organizations typically integrated these tools with the ERP deployment and facilitated rule-based automation. RPA was difficult to scale, and required significant maintenance efforts as the scripts would break with minor changes in the underlying ERP processes.
Soon enough, new technologies like Intelligent Document Processing (IDP) and Artificial Intelligence (AI) helped enhance the value proposition of RPA in ERP automation. As ERP deployments moved to the cloud, integrating these technologies and prototyping automation use cases became slightly easier. Nonetheless, automating ERP processes remains a challenging affair.
Key challenges underpinning enterprise automation today
- Use of point solutions that automate a few tasks within a process but contribute to the tool sprawl and increase maintenance efforts.
- Difficulty in scaling automated processes that employ different technologies like AI, IDP, and/or RPA.
- Inability to keep automation deployments functional when business processes evolve or undergo minor changes.
- Reliance on vendors other than the ERP provider for sourcing automation capabilities adds to the cost and vendor complexity.
- High time-to-value because of the amount of development effort and time required for building automations for a handful of processes.
- Low return on investment (RoI) as partial automation yields only marginal efficiency and productivity improvements.