In spirit both traditional and RPA strive to bring software systems together to automate business processes but there are few areas where RPA is different and scores above traditional approach.
RPA does not need complex programming and testing efforts. RPA tools are user friendly and provide “record and play” type of automation. They usually have a faster turnaround time than traditional automation.
There can be multiple reasons where traditional automation might not be an option
Automating these type of systems will need deep knowledge of the software and some customers might be restricted to make any changes and traditional automation might not be an option.
Since RPA works on the UI layer and these restrictions typically might not apply and RPA can be an ideal option.
Traditional automation is primarily based on programming and relies on APIs and other integration methods to integrate different systems. RPA on the other hand mimics the actions of a user at an User Interface level.
In traditional automation the developer needs to have a good understanding of the target system wheres in RPA since the robot is mimicking the user actions and as long as the robot can exactly follow the steps we don’t need to worry about the complexity of the underlying application.
RPA is geared towards techno functional SMEs who can teach the robots what to do wheres traditional automation projects need software developers and requires significant IT involvement.
One of the key benefit of an RPA automation can be that it can be personalized for a particular user. For e.g. the bot can read an email, extract information , do something and reply back to the email.
In addition to the reasons mentioned above, the following table lists a few more:
| Criteria | Robotic Process Automation | Traditional Automation |
| Technology | Non-intrusive, scalable & versatile | Intrusive, less scalable & not versatile |
| Interface | Mimics human action | Relies on coding & APIs |
| Customization | Very good | Average |
| Integration | Excellent | Average |
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