New Automation Anywhere Program Showcases Partners With AI Expertise

‘That need for automation, that need to drive efficient business processes across a dispersed workforce, the need to give customers a set of products and services is something they didn‘t even know they needed prior to the pandemic. We’re seeing some of the large ISVs go out and start to dip their toes into automation and that’s a massive validation of this space,’ says Ben Yerushalmi, senior vice president of global alliances and channels at Automation Anywhere.

Automotion Anywhere, a key player in the robotic process automation (RPA) space, recently launched its Verified Services Partner Program that helps customers work with service partners that are experts in AI-powered platforms to transform their business and automate processes.

“The top analyst firms have all said the pandemic drove that trend toward automation forward five to seven years,” Ben Yerushalmi, senior vice president of global alliances and channels at Automation Anywhere, told CRN. “That need for automation, that need to drive efficient business processes across a dispersed workforce, the need to give customers a set of products and services is something they didn't even know they needed prior to the pandemic. We’re seeing some of the large ISVs go out and start to dip their toes into automation, and that’s a massive validation of this space.

“That trend toward being digital-first is going to need to be underpinned by automation,” he added. “And that is the genie that you can‘t put back in the bottle.”

The program was launched with about 20 global verified services partners, including BP3, Deloitte and Infosys, which were all part of the initial pilot.

“The partner ecosystem is really the lifeblood of this company and is critical to our success going forward,” Yerushalmi told CRN.

[Related: Automation Anywhere‘s Chris Riley: Partners ‘Key To Supporting Customers On Their Automation Journey’]

“At Infosys, we enable our customers to adopt a comprehensive approach to scaling AI and automation enterprisewide,” Balakrishna D R, senior vice president of AI and Automation Infosys, said in a statement. “We deliver this by leveraging our applied AI capabilities, along with Automation Anywhere offerings, such as RPA as a Service, Automation Anywhere Robotic Interface and IQ Bot. We are excited to be one of the first members of the Automation Anywhere Verified Services Partner Program to help clients improve operational efficiencies in their digital journey.”

Yerushalmi said building a program that recognizes all of the different value propositions that a partner brings supports that partner ecosystem.

“We‘re making sure that our partners know exactly how to engage with us and we know exactly how to engage the partners to drive all those different motions to market,” he told CRN. “The value for that to the customer is that when they’re selecting partners, they’re going to be able to say, ‘This is a partner that has met all the criteria and has a track record of driving customer success,’” he said.

“We see partners really starting to recognize that it‘s not just about automation for automation’s sake, but really focusing on those key lines of business, those key industries and those key processes,” he told CRN. “Partners are recognizing that as we move toward intelligent automation and as we recover from the pandemic in sort of this new normal, there’s a whole lot out there. As people look at the new normal and how we need to work going forward, there’s a massive opportunity and customers need partners to help them navigate that.”

As the program grows, he said 85 percent of San Jose, Calif.-based Automation Anywhere’s business is going be through ist partner ecosystems.

“We‘re going to be launching additional programs in the partner program that focus on the different motions that we’ve got with partners,” he said.

Automation Anywhere Wednesday unveiled Automation Anywhere for Contact Centers, which is a cloud-native, AI-driven automation offering that enables agents to become more efficient in finding, retrieving and updating information, as well as executing client transactions quickly while reducing hold times.

“As we look to do more and more for our customers in the market, you look at the value proposition between the customer and the partner,” Yerushalmi said. “Everything from continuous process improvement from running a center of excellence, to helping them with reporting and analytics around intelligent automation, enterprise scaling from business units to other geographies, running MSPs BPOS all the way up through full blown digital and business transformation.”