In today’s rapidly evolving business landscape, automation and innovation are at the forefront of operational efficiency, making it easier for business users to automate time-consuming manual tasks, redirect human resources towards higher-value activities, and drive growth over time.
This is where SAP Intelligent Robotic Process Automation (IRPA) comes in to help!
Keep reading to learn about the key components and capabilities of SAP Intelligent RPA, how it can help automate processes in your SAP ECC system, and where our team of SAP consultants can come in to help.
What is SAP IRPA?
SAP IRPA (Intelligent Robotic Process Automation) is an automation suite designed to leverage software robots that mimic humans by replicating repetitive tasks to automate existing processes, build and run automation projects, and reduce human error across your SAP solutions.
The SAP IRPA solution is made up of three core components, including:
- SAP IRPA Cloud Factory: Facilitates the orchestration of automations in SAP
- SAP IRPA Desktop Studio: Designs the automation process across multiple systems
- SAP IRPA Desktop Agent: Executes automations and mass creation of automated activities
Understanding Intelligent Robotic Process Automation in SAP
Robotic Process Automation (RPA) is a technology that leverages machine learning (ML) and artificial intelligence (AI) capabilities to automate repetitive, rule-based business processes, identify areas of improvement, and reduce the time and manual effort required to complete day-to-day tasks.
With pre-built functionality in SAP Intelligent RPA, companies are enabled to:
- Improve resource allocation and mobilization for high-value tasks
- Leverage intelligent automation to reduce human error and improve efficiency
- Remove time-consuming, tedious tasks to enhance user engagement and satisfaction
- Generate well-documented audit trails to improve and maintain compliance
- Automate web applications, legacy business solutions, and other SaaS offerings
- Improve flexibility and agility to support strategic business initiatives
How Does SAP Intelligent RPA Work?
SAP Intelligent RPA takes a low code/no code approach to data manipulation, management, and migration, meaning that users don’t have to start from scratch, remove or change existing code, or build new code whenever they need to build complex features, scripts, or bots.
Here are the main features included in the SAP Intelligent RPA solution:
End-to-End Automation
With a comprehensive digital landscape that leverages heterogeneous user interfaces (UIs), third-party applications, and other automation tools, SAP Intelligent RPA provides the resources users need to build and execute attended and unattended bots, standardize operations, and facilitate end-to-end automation.
Improved Developer Experiences
SAP IRPA Version 2.0 offers a simplified design studio and pre-built connection to the Cloud Factory to facilitate more efficient configuration, orchestration, and monitoring capabilities across the entire SAP system.
And by leveraging a low-code experience and connections to user documentation features and an active developer community, SAP IRPA offers an intuitive experience for users and developers alike.
Ready-to-Use Solutions
SAP IRPA provides intuitive bot templates for SAP S/4HANA and SAP ECC, allowing customers to improve efficiency and compliance, create a robust digital workforce across SAP and non-SAP systems, and deploy bot packages throughout the entire SAP landscape.
These bot packages can also be adapted directly in the SAP Cloud Studio to help organizations remain agile and competitive over time.
Advanced Flexibility
In the modern (and ever-changing) AI and automation landscape, businesses need flexible solutions that allow them to manage existing on-premise, hybrid, or cloud-based systems while also leveraging improved agility to adapt new innovations as needed.
With intelligent connections to the S/4HANA-based core, SAP IRPA allows business users to stay relevant and competitive in the industry, drive future growth, and avoid getting trapped in legacy systems or outdated UIs.
SAP Process Automation Development Kit
Here are the main automation packages created and maintained in SAP Process Automation:
1) Core SDK Package
The Core SDK Package comprises the most frequent activities in SAP Intelligent RPA and groups them into modules, some of which contain specific activities for connectors, predefined data types, and other tools. With this functionality, users can build and run automation projects more efficiently. Activities in the Core SDK Package can be used in a few specific SAP IRPA use cases, including:
- Start or close previously captured applications
- Define, trigger, or retrieve previously declared elements
- Activate, check, or close application screens
2) Excel SDK Package
The Excel SDK Package provides the resources needed to help business users access, manipulate, and exchange Microsoft Excel files and create automations using Microsoft Excel. It contains Application, Workbook, Worksheet, Enumeration, and Excel Helper modules to manage activities and Microsoft Excel instances, define Excel constants, and map values from a specific worksheet to its associated data type.
3) Outlook SDK Package
The Outlook SDK Package comprises activities for accessing and manipulating Microsoft Outlook emails and creating automations using Microsoft Outlook. This collection of activities is structured into two different modules, including:
- Application Module: This module manages and stores all the global activities used to handle Outlook instances (start, stop, release, etc.)
- Email Module: This module contains all the activities allowing users to send, delete, save, move, or search emails in Microsoft Outlook
How Can We Help?
Whether you need help implementing new SAP applications to improve operational efficiency, additional support navigating through the SAP IRPA bot store, or expert guidance to decide which areas of your organization could benefit from automations, Surety Systems is here to help.
Our team of senior-level, US-based SAP consultants has the experience and know-how to handle your most important SAP project needs, including system implementations, integrations, or upgrades.
Getting Started with Our Team
If you want to learn how SAP Intelligent Robotic Process Automation can help you create automations and improve efficiencies or where our team of SAP consultants can fit in your organization, contact us today!
