Cos aim to boost revenue with AI, not just reduce cost: Automation Anywhere

With agentic AI and automation, enterprises are now targeting topline growth over just cost savings, says Automation Anywhere, as adoption spreads beyond GCCs

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Automation Anywhere, an agentic process automation (APA) company, is seeing more companies focus on business transformation and revenue growth programmes using agentic artificial intelligence (AI) rather than just cost reduction and improving efficiency.

 

The company, backed by Goldman Sachs and SoftBank Vision Fund, said the focus is more on end-to-end automation, back end to front end instead of automating certain mission critical processes as enterprises seek more return on investment from their AI endeavour.

 

“We do see more topline related projects getting the greenlight from the chief executives,” Ankur Kothari, cofounder and chief operating officer, told Business Standard.  “That is because we have now put AI with automation.”

 

That will be a significant shift because it implies companies are looking to move up the value curve in terms of automation.

 

Companies usually derive value from AI and agentic AI through cost reduction, improvement in net promoter score (NPS) which is from customer experience and customer service, and risk protection and compliance.

 

  Revenue growth is the ultimate goal where AI helps enterprises create new product offerings and thus new revenue streams.  

 

When asked if clients, which include Petrobras, Nestle, and Cargill, are going slow on discretionary spend projects and focused more on cost take out ones, Kothari said revenue growth remains a priority. “There is also the pressure for growth. If they can accelerate growth with technology, they can get the green light from the CEO faster. While cost take out is very important, risk reduction and increasing topline are priorities too. When they pick transformation programs, revenue improvement becomes a part of the discussion,” Kothari said.

 

Kothari did not disclose how much growth customers have generated using the company’s products or solutions but added that Petrobras was able to save a few hundred million dollars by using an AI driven tax programme. 

 

Similarly, a law firm created an agentic tariff advisor that created a new revenue stream.

 

Infosys chief technology officer Rafee Tarafdar, in a recent interaction with Business Standard, said revenue and growth vertical is evolving as it needs a bit of process re-engineering and business model re-engineering, which should happen in the coming months and years.

 

Automation Anywhere started as a robotic process automation (RPA) company almost two decades ago. It says that agentic automation can automate 40-80 per cent of work processes in contrast to robotic process automation (RPA) which can automate only 20-30 per cent.

 

While most of the company’s revenue is from the US, Automation Anywhere sees India to be a key market, though it contributes a small portion to the topline.

 

Most of the revenue from India is from global capability centres (GCC) but increasingly more Indian companies are looking to embrace a combination of automation and AI for greater benefits.

 

“70 per cent of our clients in India use AI plus automation now and we want to take it to 90 per cent in the next two years,” added Kothari.