Monthly Archives: June 2020

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If automation is increasingly important in the digital workplace, one of the principle enablers of automation is DevOps. DevOps is everywhere, and has been for a long time, but in terms of automation it makes software and app delivery a lot quicker, enabling enterprises that have developed it to push it to market sooner and making it more reliable for the end user.

Amazon Web Services describes DevOps, or to be more accurate the DevOps model, as a combination of cultural philosophies, practices and tools that increases an organization's ability to deliver applications and services at high velocity. It also enables developers to evolve and improve products at a faster pace than organizations using traditional software development and infrastructure management processes.

So, what exact role does it have in the workplace? First and foremost, DevOps continuous delivery and consistent cadence of software releases have a major role to play in the operations strategies of the IT organization, Pushpraj Kumar, business analyst at India-based iFour Technolab, told us. It can make automation of operations such as development, testing, production infrastructure, configuring networks at the digital workplace. DevOps supports digital infrastructure, it can manage the application running on it and can maintain the transitions, upgrades as well.

DevOps accelerate digital services, continuous improvement, operational flexibility, and could provide innovative and cost-effective ways for delivering high-value automation development and operations, he said.

From this is would seem that artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning (ML)are next in the pipe for DevOps. However, Michael Fritz Fritzius of St. Louis-based Arch DevOpspointed out that many companies still have not figured out how to do regular DevOps properly, which makes it difficult for AI or ML.

CTOs, CIOs and VPs all over the world continue to struggle with making quick decisions when deadlines loom. More often than not, those decisions are rooted in fear, which causes people to guess wrong about the problems needing to be solved, and it creates a mess, he said.

DevOps, though, has been around for a long time even if it has not been named as such. Even still, very few companies understand DevOps well enough to execute it properly. AI and ML are new concepts that are available to the public, but even they are so cutting edge that the vast majorities will not know how to implement it properly. It is likely to be years or maybe decades until companies can do either right.

Long story short: I don't think we need to be thinking about how to use AI and ML in the day-to-day until it matures enough to be extremely easy to use, he said.

Rick Stewart is chief software technologist at Herndon, Va.-based DLT Solutions. He points out that DevOps is not just about development, but about a cultural movement focusing on a shared understanding between developers and operations and sharing responsibility for the software/services they build.

When done properly, digital workplaces employing DevOps practices display an increase in transparency, communication, and collaboration across development, IT/operations, and all stakeholders within a workplace.

A common attitude in an organization with a mature DevOps mindset is continuous improvement, which constantly looks for efficiencies in all aspects of the workflow that produces services that are highly available, secure, resilient, and flexible for changing needs on a frequent basis.

Software development and deployment, he said, is a highly repetitive process and the removal of manual processes is imperative so that most important features and capabilities can be deployed in small increments on a frequent basis to serve end user's needs in a timely manner.

Manual activities are prone to human error and most likely cause bottlenecks when trying to deliver services to the workforce especially in testing. Automation is also critical when it comes to infrastructure to allow a workforce resources to expand and contract based on usage brings cost efficiencies to the organization.

There is a reason why DevOps is expressed as an infinite loop as those activities executed repeatedly providing feedback to the teams exposing any inefficiencies that can be addressed in a subsequent iteration.

Finally, a characteristic of a DevOps culture is joy. It may seem trite, but an effective DevOps practice addresses the most important feature/capability at every iteration or deployment, he said.

End users expect their services to always be available when they need them and are easily frustrated when their experience is not seamless. By increasing the ability to deliver important features fast on resilient infrastructure, DevOps addresses all stakeholders primary needs which leads to happiness in the workplace, he said.

DevOps is critical to speed new code and services into production with minimal risk. However, how quickly new services can be brought to market are dependent upon how isolated they are from other services and how fast they can move through the DevOps process, Eva Tuczai, advanced solutions product management and engagement manager of Boston-based Turbonomic, said.

The goal is to bring services to market quickly by breaking apps into small discrete parts that can be independently changed and using automation to move through the process quickly and efficiently. DevOps is a combination of scale (many independent parts) and speed (automated process that minimizes or eliminates human overhead).

The automation wave has overtaken IT departments everywhere, she said making DevOps a critical piece of infrastructure technology. What is next for DevOps? We need to look no further than artificial intelligence and machine learning, she said. Now she sees specialization in two areas:

Automation, AI/ML, and other advances are going to enable DevOps to scale in large enterprises and therefore to have the kind of impact that DevOps promises in terms of rapid innovation, differentiating new capabilities, and technology teams meeting and exceeding the needs of the business. This will result in an acceleration of digital transformation for those larger organizations and for the customers they serve according to Richard Hawes, director of product marketing for DevOps at Santa Clara, Calif-based ServiceNow.

He said that while DevOps is transforming the efficiency of the way products are delivered, there is still more in the DevOps space itself that can be automated. While individual teams can become agile and iterate rapidly, the pace of innovation slows down when those teams must participate in the broader business processes and culture.

The larger the organization, the more regulation they are subjected to, and the more risk averse they must be. Automation of corporate requirements, such as production release stage gates (e.g. activities traditionally associated with ITIL management techniques), will result in DevOps delivering at its full potential.

Compliance remains a challenge in any real-world development environment and growth of continuous compliance capabilities, such leveraging corporate Integrated Risk Management approaches, will also contribute to the success of DevOps initiatives, he said."

Companies are starting to standardize on DevOps toolchains, but a vast variety of tools remain in use even within individual organizations. Standardization on DevOps platforms will continue but, thanks to the rate of change and experimentation, for some time there will be a need for cross-tool DevOps management platforms (i.e. along the lines of Value Stream Management).

DevOps brings the business closer to the technologists that are delivering the solutions by focusing work into teams that own a business product or are directly aligned with a value stream, he added.

Continued here:

How DevOps Is Automating the Workplace - CMSWire

Taskila wastewater treatment plant

Taskila wastewater treatment plant in the City of Oulu. The new sludge treatment plant will be located in the lawn area next to the yellow thickeners.

Valmet Oyjs trade press release on June 22, 2020 at 11:00 a.m. EET

Valmet will supply automation system extension and solids measurements to Oulu Waterworks Taskila wastewater treatment plant located in Oulu, Finland. With modern wastewater treatment solutions, the plant can stabilize the sludge and treat it more efficiently and meet the environmental criteria also in the future.

The order was included in Valmets orders received of the first quarter 2020. The order will be delivered during the second half of 2020 and the commissioning will be in the first quarter of 2021. The value of the order is not disclosed.

The collaboration with Valmet has been smooth both in this project and before. The current sludge treatment facility in Taskila has reached the end of its lifecycle after 20 years operation. A new plant with modern sludge treatment solutions will ensure trouble-free and efficient treatment of Oulu's sewage sludge well into the future, says Jarmo Lahtinen, Operations Manager, Oulu Waterworks.

"Valmet DNA is a reliable automation system for managing wastewater treatment processes. We are pleased that Oulu Waterworks, our long-term partner, has decided to extend and upgrade their existing system," says Jarmo Harjuoja, Manager, Customer Service, Automation, Valmet.

"We are confident that our solid measurements and innovative technology will increase reliability and sustainability when optimizing the wastewater treatment process," tells Juha Kesti, Sales Manager, Measurements and Analyzers, Automation, Valmet.

Information about the delivery

Valmet's delivery includes an extension and upgrades to the existing Valmet DNA automation and information management system, Valmet Total Solids Measurements (Valmet TS), Valmet Low Solids Measurements (Valmet LS), and Valmet Dry Solids Measurements (Valmet DS). Additionally, the delivery includes field engineering of the automation application and instrumentation, factory acceptance testing, automation system installation, commissioning, and training.

Information about the customer Oulu Waterworks

Oulu Waterworks is a municipal water treatment institute that is responsible for water supply and sewerage in Haukipudas, Kiiminki, Oulu, Oulunsalo, Yli-Ii, and Ylikiiminki in Finland. Oulu Waterworks provides high-quality and reliable water services to almost 200,000 residents of the Oulu region.

Oulu Waterworks has two wastewater treatment facilities. The majority of the wastewater is treated in the City of Oulus Taskila treatment plant which is the biggest wastewater treatment plant in Northern Finland.

Taskila wastewater treatment plant in the City of Oulu. The new sludge treatment plant will be located in the lawn area next to the yellow thickeners.

VALMET Corporate Communications

For further information, please contact:Jarmo Harjuoja, Manager, Customer Service, Automation, Valmet, tel. +358 40543 4726 Juha Kesti, Sales Manager, Measurements and Analyzers, Automation, Valmet, tel. +358 44980 2218

Valmet is the leading global developer and supplier of process technologies, automation and services for the pulp, paper and energy industries. We aim to become the global champion in serving our customers.

Valmet's strong technology offering includes pulp mills, tissue, board and paper production lines, as well as power plants for bioenergy production. Our advanced services and automation solutions improve the reliability and performance of our customers' processes and enhance the effective utilization of raw materials and energy.

Valmet's net sales in 2019 were approximately EUR 3.5 billion. Our more than 13,000 professionals around the world work close to our customers and are committed to moving our customers' performance forward - every day. Valmet's head office is in Espoo, Finland and its shares are listed on the Nasdaq Helsinki.

Read more http://www.valmet.com, http://www.twitter.com/valmetglobal

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Valmet to supply automation and solids measurements to Oulu Waterworks' wastewater treatment plant in Finland - GlobeNewswire

As automation grows, so too does the need for safety awareness and remediationVirtual safety training enables people to learn through their mistakes, yet without risk.

Automation has been an understandable focus in manufacturing for years now. And despite the recent wave of layoffs caused by the COVID-19 pandemic, the push will probably continue.

As Joe Campbell, senior manager of applications development at Universal Robots USA Inc., Ann Arbor, Mich., sees it, the sudden availability of more labor wont change the trend toward automation because manufacturers are not going to be able to fix the labor problem with people who are displaced from other industries. They dont have the skills or the interest in the factory. Youre not going to take a mortgage processor and put him or her in the middle of a manufacturing plant. If you tried, it would cost a fortune in training and at the end of the day, the satisfaction for that job would be extremely low.

But, automation comes with its own set of risks to the safety of those who are in the factory. Here is how best to keep employees safe in a shop that has more and more automation.

The first stage in ensuring the safety of your personnel is identifying and quantifying the dangers they face. Luckily, vendors are working hard to minimize those risks up front. Or as Universal Robots Global Technical Compliance Officer Roberta Nelson Shea put it, Every stage in the supply chain is in effect doing a risk assessment. We, as manufacturers, do a risk assessment so that our product is designed, constructed, put together, even put in a box, such that risks are lessened to the extent that we foresee.

As Glenn Nausley, president of industrial equipment manufacturer Promess Inc., Brighton, Mich., explained, todays equipment generally has safety built-in to include a level of redundancy. Whether its being monitored by a safety relay or by a safety PLC, you cant have one failure that creates a safety liability in a station or a machine.

That means if counting on a door switch for safety, it must have two contacts so that if one contact fails, the other one will still stop the machine. The machine is not allowed to start up again until its repaired. If depending on a light curtain, it must have a dual circuit and both circuits must agree on whether the light curtain is broken or not.

Nausley also explained that manufacturers follow ISO guidelines in establishing required performance levels for the safety-related control systems in their equipment. These guidelines consider the severity of potential injury, the degree of exposure to the hazard, and the possibility of avoiding or limiting the potential harm. For example, if its maintenance that has to be done once every quarter, and you use a very specialized, skilled person, then you can be a little less safe But if its a high-volume, high-exposure type of environment, the operator shouldnt be able to hurt himself if he falls asleep while running the machine.

Promess makes electro-mechanical presses and torque units that go into assembly, press fit, crimping, staking, and similar systems. For routine operation, its equipments safety functions meet Performance Level (PL) PLd, which has a probability of dangerous failure between 0.00001 and 0.0001 percent per hour (the second highest rating). Some of its maintenance safety functions are built to the PLc level (0.0001 to 0.0003 percent). Nausley added that the safety controls are often more sophisticated than simply go/no go. For example, the light curtain might allow an operator to approach a press as its retracting, because its safe moving in that direction. But if the press changes direction and starts coming down it will E-stop if the operator is still in the light curtain. This would allow an operator to load parts or perform other functions without shutting down operation while also not compromising safety.

A more complex example is the notion of allowing an inherently dangerous process to continue at a so-called safe speed. In this case, youre counting on the operator (or more likely the maintenance technician) to be aware of and avoid the danger, owing to the slower speed. The system will not prevent injury if the human deliberately acts stupidly. The goal is to provide safety while also adding to productivity.

Beyond safety systems inherent in the equipment, using that equipment in combination with other gear and personnel increases risk as well. Nelson Shea said robots, especially cobots, are now used where end users previously did not use any robots and might not have had the experience in implementing automation in risk assessments. The very first risk assessment is fraught with the greatest anxiety.

Although the robot itself may have excellent safety functions, the robot maker generally does not know how its robot is being used, or even what end effector it will have. (Most robots have safety functions that meet PLd with either a category 2 or 3 architecture, enabling integration with safety devices and other machines.) Thats why its advisable to use a good integrator.

Happily, its easy to identify one, because as Campbell explained, the Robotics Industry Association has an integrator certification program and to become certified, [an integrator] must pass a rather rigorous audit, which includes knowledge and application of the safety standards. On the other hand, said Campbell, there are well-understood safety protocols and risk assessment tools for robots, so educating the new user is not difficult. And Nelson Shea said once somebody goes through a risk assessment, the next one takes a quarter of the time, and the next one perhaps less. She added that new-generation robots are much easier to operate then those of years past.

In addition to the change to robots, any change to the working environment brings new risks and hazards, according to John Dony, director of the Campbell Institute of the National Safety Council, Itasca, Illinois. The single biggest thing for employers to consider is appropriate risk analysis and change management procedures when introducing a new piece of equipment, operating procedure or other change, he said. Dony also noted that involving the workforce directly in these activitiesas they are the closest to the riskis a best practice and, additionally, a great way to engage workers.

John Hindman, director of learning and performance improvement at manufacturing training provider Tooling U-SME, Cleveland, agreed, saying health and safety must definitely be partnered with both engineering and manufacturing to make sure that theres proper hazard identification as these installations go into place. Developing good practices for working within these components should become part of standard work instructions, and part of the training for someone to be qualified to work with these components.

Campbell added that when it comes to automation, the first step is gaining a good understanding of the manual process. If you dont understand the manual process, the probability of a successful implementation of an automatic process is about nil. So, understand what your skilled operators are doing. And, by the way, that is probably going to be slightly different than what your manufacturing engineering department thinks theyre doing!

Campbells approach is to focus on fundamentals like payload, sequence of operations, cycle time, required precision, and the work envelope. He then specifies a system with ample headroom over the presumed requirements, because otherwise you dont leave yourself any room for a surprise. Dont accept a project that requires the robot to operate at greater than 70 percent of its top speed. Dont accept a project that requires the robot to operate at greater than 70 percent of its maximum work envelope. The same goes for precision. These are keep-yourself-out-of-trouble recommendations that have proven to be helpful over the years.

Once youve defined the application, said Nelson Shea, what you need to do from a safety standpoint is think about how everything will be laid out. She believes it is possible to reduce or eliminate about one-third of all hazardous situations simply by placing the equipment based on understanding where people might have to be stationed.

You want to make sure that for any interaction a person has with the automation, their path to that interaction point, their activity while at it, and their path away are all the paths and interactions that are easy for them. Then they will always do it that way, she explained. If designed to be easy, it is safeguarded so that the person will be safe. But if there is a complex route to get there, forcing the person to do some odd body position in order to do what they need to do, theyre going to alter it, and then in altering it they may expose themselves to hazard, she said.

Nelson Shea stressed the importance of a dialogue with the operator about fundamentals like where they get the part, whether or not they inspect it and where, whether they need certain tools and if the tools must be carried or can be pre-positioned. Once the workflows are understood, it all falls into place just like a line of dominoes, she said. Then a task-based application risk assessment is performed, where guidance can be found in RIA TR R15.306.

Harold Baro, senior vice president and general manager of SIMOS Insourcing Solutions, an Atlanta-based labor management firm, raised another concern for situations that require people to work in conjunction with automation: a language barrier. He said some systems use voice commands and their ability to handle different dialects or languages is not a trivial matter.

Nausley of Promess made the point that integrators also need to ensureas much as possiblethat each new piece of equipment functions similarly when it comes to safety. For example, the method for electrically locking out a station must carry across the entire line. Every single operation on a line has to have the same procedures for safety. And the more complex equipment gets, the more difficult that [uniformity] becomes, he said.

Naturally, training is a key part of ensuring safety in the workplace. Campbell said Universal Robots encourages its customers to get some hands-on experience with the robot before any installation, and it has 55 training centers worldwide to this end. It also has what Campbell described as a fantastic, free, online academy where we have trained over 90,000 people. It really does leave people with the fundamentals of robot application and programming. Thats been very effective in getting people familiar with the technology and understanding how its going to work.

Tooling U-SMEs Hindman argued that just because there are safety mechanisms in place with a lot of this automation, that doesnt replace the need for the human to apply good safety awareness, and that takes training. He pointed to the value of behavioral-based training programs and said that where theyre driven from the floor, theres participation from a great percentage of the workforce.

But, added Hindman, the manufacturing community as a whole has not done a particularly good job of making sure that every worker takes responsibility for safety and keeps it in mind every day. Companies need to combat complacency by driving the safety message, possibly using automated systems, and creating a safety culture from the floor itself, he said.

Nelson Shea of Universal Robots observed that automation is undergoing a paradigm shift that counteracts this complacency. She explained that in contrast to years past, in which automation was introduced only for high-volume applications and people were literally locked out of virtually all interaction with the automaton (with the exception of maintenance by skilled technicians), todays systems are used for all sorts of shorter run jobs. In these situations, the operator is also the robot programmer, which is allowing these people to improve their skills and be more engaged in manufacturing within the company, because theyre not little drones tending the massive machine.

As Campbell put it, Traditional automation took an all-or-nothing approach. Either you automated the entire process or the project didnt carry. But what were seeing now is a model of incremental automation. You dont have to pick the million-dollar problem. Go pick the $75,000 problem, automate it, get your payback quickly, and then look for another $75,000 problem. Were seeing that again and again.

Hindman said behavioral-based training programs, as good as they are, tend to go stale fast, especially when theyre forced from leadership. But, said Dony of the National Safety Council, new technologies are being used as channels to keep people engaged and address differing learning styles. Even taking the age of the worker out of the equation, everyone has a different learning style that appeals most to them. He also noted that by using technologies such as micro-learning or augmented reality/virtual reality (AR/VR) to supplement or replace either hands-on or classroom training, organizations can be more effective in teaching their employees.

Hindman agreed and said Tooling U-SME is developing VR platforms now. Health and safety will be built into every one of these to allow people to make mistakes, because thats the way people learn the best, he said. So, if we can create safe environments for workers to make those mistakes, that prevents them from doing it in real life and hurting themselves and hurting their coworkers.

For example, they can use the wrong fire extinguisher in a virtual reality environment, make things worse, and see the whole plant burn down. Its an effective technique to get workers, especially younger workers who are not familiar with working in manufacturing environments, to adopt more awareness of what could go wrong, said Hindman.

He also pointed to newsfeed platforms like Beekeeper as a good way to push the safety message. Companies that are struggling or dont see any forward movement on safety programs are the ones that just keep things as they are, letting things get stale, Hindman added. You have to mix up the messaging, and even rotate new people into the programs.

Wayne Chaneski, president of consultancy Smart Manufacturing Solutions, Edison, N.J., said increasing the likelihood of maintaining a safe environment requires safety audits at least monthly and more frequently if they have the resources available. He also argued that performance on such audits is the best metric of safety, in contrast to traditional measures like counting lost time accidents. The audit document can best be developed by each company, based on their own operations, but if they are stuck, OSHA has a small business safety audit document they can use, and modify to suit their needs.

Performance tracking can be based on any of the following: safety violations found, percent of audit questions that produce non-conformances, audits completed on-time, corrective actions implemented, and more. This type of auditing is effective regardless of the industry or technologies employed, Chaneski said, adding that safety audits are most effective when performed by a team from different departments. This team should be made up of one or two core personnel and rotating members, perhaps on a quarterly basis. The team does the safety audit and reports the result. This way, you are not relying as much on self-reporting.

Hindman echoed this concern, saying that workers generally wont report a fellow employee doing something unsafe. Aside from the need to attend to their own tasks, theyre not going to risk getting that individual into trouble, and creating a bad relationship, he said.

For installation projects or ongoing construction, Dony said the key factors are sound management of change and communication. These are environments that can change rapidly, and if a worker comes onto the job without understanding what may have transpired overnight or from shift to shift, the potential for harm goes up exponentially. Practices such as signed change or work orders, shift transition safety huddles, and strong permitting procedures are all helpful in controlling the risks.

Other than some high-level policies for things like measles that directed you to call the local health department, industry hadnt really planned for the novel coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic, which began in earnest in the U.S. in March, according to John Hindman of Tooling U-SME. But as John Dony of the National Safety Council put it, We have learned a massive amount in the past six weeks [at the time of this writing] around managing infectious disease in the workplace, though we still have a long way to go.

Some clear guidelines have emerged around physical distancing, disinfection and other practices, but broader questions remain about re-engineering our workplaces to be pandemic-proof in the future, as well as making it safe to return to in the near term. (Visit nsc.org/safer to learn more about the National Safety Councils Safe Actions for Employee Returns [SAFER] task force to address these issues.)

Harold Baro of SIMOS Insourcing Solutions suggested directing traffic properly so you dont have traffic going two ways in particular aisles, keep people going the same direction so they can maintain social distancing, and spreading out the break time so youre minimizing the number of people in break rooms.

Joe Campbell of Universal Robots USA said his company has seen a lot of interest in how to build social distancing into the manufacturing floor on a permanent basis. People are rethinking their processes and asking about the possibility of cobots taking over certain tasks where the available floor space doesnt allow for sufficient distancing between operators, he said.

Hindman pointed to greater flexibility regarding absences. Typically, in manufacturing, if you dont show up on the fourth day, youre gone. Many companies are now being more lenient with those policies. Others are waiving short-term disability if someone does get sick. It remains to be seen if these policies will carry on after this crisis has passed.

But Hindman holds out hope that the COVID-19 outbreak will at least foster a lasting attitude of both personal and social responsibility. We now have almost everyone taking account of how theyre feeling each day, and whether or not they should be going into work, because they have concern for their coworkers. That type of attitude and accountability should apply to manufacturing workers when they see a spill on the floor as well. They should be worried about their coworkers. This is an opportunity for manufacturing to look again at behavioral-based safety and let everyone take accountability for the health and safety of all of their coworkers. A profound and welcome change indeed.

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Safety Best Practices for the Age of Automation - Advanced Manufacturing

The COVID-19 pandemic has created an economic turmoil, where industries and businesses have come to a standstill.Organisations are also suffering losses due to the shortfall in productivity due to the lockdown.

In this scenario, one of the leading ecommerce players in India, which has a warehouse spread over 100,000 square feet, faced the challenge of carrying out quality checks on all the goods that were coming into the facility.

Being a very human-intensive exercise, the company had to engage with a computer vision startup to deploy its automation technologies to do the job.

Automation technologies have been around for some time, with their deployment at various levels like chatbots, automated tele-calling, voice assistants, or the industrialised robotic environment. But now, the trigger has come in the form of COVID-19, where there seems to be an urgency to deploy these technologies.

Indian IT industry body Nasscom, in a report title COVID-19 Tipping for automation", says the pandemic has acted as a catalyst for the development of automation technologies.

While the financial services sector has been one of the early adopters of automation technologies with likes of banks, insurance companies, etc., the manufacturing and ecommerce sectors have stepped up their automation efforts. However, sectors which have lower digitisation capability are generally slower in adopting automation.

Milan Sheth, Executive Vice President India, Middle East, and Africa East region, Automation Anywhere, a robotic process automation unicorn, says,

According to him, companies and industries are increasingly relying on automation to ensure there is continuity in operations, faster return on investment, and it has the ability to generate revenue even during these times.

He cites the example of car insurance, which requires onsite inspection, and hence human interaction. In this time of COVID-19, one can do it remotely by doing the inspection through the computer vision platform, thereby minimising the risk, and also generating revenue for the insurance company.

Umesh Sachdev, Co-founder of Uniphore, a conversational AI startup, says, the multifold increase in the number of calls over the last three months reveals the need for automation and AI.

It is a rude shock for companies being forced to take this decision. There is uncertainty, but clients want AI to automate their business, he remarks.

Accordingto AccenturesFuture Systems research, whereit conducted a survey on 8,300 companies before the COVID-19 crisis, only 10 percent of the companies had cracked the code on systems resilience.

The report clearly says artificial intelligence (AI) and automation are the way forward. In the future, key markers of adaptable organisations include enterprise-wide use of automation and AI, a continuous data supply chain in the cloud to power the AI in the enterprise, and a stable but modular, flexible, and constantly evolving architecture. About 94 percent of leaders systematically track ROIs in automation across the organisation, compared to only 47 percent of laggards.

Typically, whenever there is a crisis, the level of interaction among humans increases, and in the current situation, there is a need for automation to handle the increased load.

According to Umesh, many BPO centres have witnessed 4X traffic, and Uniphores AI platform allowed them to monitor the calls using speech-to-text platform.

UiPath, a global RPA unicorn, with its R&D centre in Bengaluru, stated that as COVID-19 pandemic continues to impact business operations, organisations around the world are facing extreme challenges, including the increased need in customer support.

For example, OTP Bank Romania is using an automation solution that integrates the capabilities of both Druid chatbots and UiPaths software robots to process requests to postpone bank loan instalments. The integration allowed the bank to cut down the processing time of a single request from 10 minutes to 20 seconds, and cope with a 125 percent increase in the number of calls received by call centre agents, enabling it to process three times more deferral requests with the same number of people in the back office.

Automation has also stepped into the area of human resource management (HRM) in a major way.

Eightfold, the talent intelligence platform, is able to match individuals and opportunities based on their potential to succeed in a role, rather than look at their past success through its AI platform.

This, in turn, increases efficiency, reduces the time taken for the entire process, and also results in cost savings.

There is also the deployment of AI and automation in an area like agriculture. Plantix, an agritech startup founded by Rob Strey and Simone Strey, which has its base in Hyderabad and Berlin, leverages AI and automation to help farmers.

The company uses AI to identify plant diseases, pests, and nutrient deficiencies. The only thing the farmer needs to do is click an image of the crop with the app installed on the smartphone and the software identifies the problem. Plantix then gives recommendations to find the right product, which helps fight the disease. The app also gives disease alert to farmers.

As many as 1.2 million farmers use the app at least once per month, says Simone.

The jury is still out on what will be the impact on jobs with the onset of automation. It is expected that there would be some loss of jobs, but it is unlikely to be large scale as automation technologies is still in its early days.

Today, automation is not just about ensuring efficiency or cutting down the costs, but it can be a key enabler for revenue generation.

The pace of automation is certainly going to increase in the days to come, and the adoption level among companies and sector can vary.

Milan of Automation Anywhere says, The progressive ones in the automation strategy are those companies which are digital-ready and the same cannot be said of those who have not digitised enough.

Automation can also bring other benefits, which a normal human being in a repetitive task might find it a strain. There is a significant increase in the adoption of automation technologies as it removes subjectivity and makes it contactless. These automation platforms have the ability to continuously learn, which makes it much more superior, says Ajith of Camcom.

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How COVID-19 is set to speed up the adoption of automation technologies - YourStory

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By Types:

Process AutomationProcess Instrumentation

By Applications:

Oil And Gas IndustryPowerChemical And PetrochemicalWater And Wastewater

Process Automation and Instrumentation Market Regions and Countries Level Analysis

The regional analysis is a very complete part of this report. This segmentation highlights Process Automation and Instrumentation sales at regional and national level. These data provide a detailed and precise analysis of the volume by country and an analysis of the market size by region of the world market.

The report provides an in-depth valuation of growth and other aspects of the market in key countries such as theUnited States, Canada, Mexico, Germany, France, the United Kingdom, Russia, the Italy, China, Japan, South Korea, India, Australia, Brazil and Saudi Arabia. The competitive landscape chapter of the global market report provides key information about market players such as company overview, total (financial) revenue, market potential, global presence, sales Process Automation and Instrumentation and the income generated, market share, prices, production sites and facilities, products offered and strategies adopted. This study provides Process Automation and Instrumentation sales, revenues and market shares for each actor covered in this report for a period between 2016 and 2020.

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Process Automation and Instrumentation Market Report Includes:

Market Outlook:Status and Dynamics.

Competitive Landscape:By Manufacturers, Vendors and Development Trends.

Product Revenue for Top Players:Market Share, Size, CAGR, Current Market Situation Analysis, Future Market Forecast for the next 5 years period.

Market Segmentation:By Types, By Applications, By End-Users, By Regions/ Geography.

Sales Revenue:Market Share, Price and Cost Analysis, Growth Rate, Current Market Analysis.

Benefits of Purchasing Process Automation and Instrumentation Market Report:

View Report TOC In detail: https://www.reportspedia.com/report/industrial-and-machinery/global-process-automation-and-instrumentation-market-2020-by-company,-regions,-type-and-application,-forecast-to-2025/55225 #table_of_contents

More:

Global Process Automation and Instrumentation Market (2019-2026) With Top Growing Companies & COVID-19 Impact Analysis - Cole of Duty

Quality assurance (QA) can be defined as part of quality management focused on providing confidence that quality requirements will be fulfilled internally to management and externally to customers, government agencies, regulators, certifiers, and third parties.

It is also defined as all the planned and systematic activities implemented within the quality system that can be demonstrated to provide confidence that a product or service will fulfill requirements for quality.

Quality assurance automation is one of the most critical processes in the software industry as well in any other sector as it gives higher accuracy, better reporting capabilities, coverage, resource efficiency, bug detection, and reusability. Right now, automation testing for QA is the talk of the town within the software industry.

Automation testing is a process using an automation tool to create and run automated test cases and predefined actions on software application software without using manual labor or testing.

The goal of automation is to reduce the number of test cases to be run manually instead of eliminating manual testing. The testing tool takes actual outcomes and compares it with the expected result to generate detailed test reports. With that being said, it is without a doubt that the essential part of the QA automation is the tests and the test results it produces.

The most significant benefit is the reduced need for software testers. Test automation results in a higher quality of work, reducing the need for fixing glitches after the product is released, which translates into reduced costs.

It can help reduce time-to-market and launch a bug-free product, by taking care of repetitive tasks with a smaller number of resources on-board, in return maximizing return on investment (ROI).

It saves time by eliminating the need to write extensive test scripts, and it can be reused. It can help with manipulating, creating, and protecting the testing database, which allows us to reuse data. Bugs can be detected during the development phase itself, which leads to shorter product development lifecycles.

Test scripts can be 24/7 with minimum to no human intervention. It also allows automated cross-browser testing tools such as LambdaTest, which can reduce the efforts by executing the same test cases many times on multiple browsers in parallel. While manual setups take time initially, automated tests tend to take a shorter amount of time.

The tests can be run 24/7 without the need for manual input, thus ensuring thorough quality checks. The reports of the QA automation can also be used alongside manual testing procedures to crosscheck your test results. The reports are extensive and give the software tester details such as scripts executed, scheduled, bugs found and fixed, etc.

The effectiveness of QA automation testing will be dependent on the quality of the test data being used.

It has a defined folder structure which can easily trace the items. It handles errors and recovery scenarios within the framework rather than in the scripts. Scripting guidelines, naming conventions, and standards are documented. Moreover, proper trace-ability is visible to understand the coverage of the automation and execution of the defects.

Automated testing also includes testing of web applications on all the browsers. The framework is environment independent. By configuring the browser, OS, etc., the framework can be made environment independent.

It offers a high level of scalability through additional test executors to the testing platform or tool.

Before deciding on conducting automated testing, here are some quick questions you should consider: How big/small is the project? What is the scope of the project? What are your resources (i.e. budget)? Will your budget allow you to spend much on QA automation? Will the cost of automation be cost-effective? How much time can you save with automated tests? Who are the involved stakeholders in the project?

It is also noteworthy that test cases that are newly designed and not executed manually, which includes frequently changing requirements, and that are performed on an ad-hoc basis, are not suitable for automation. There should also be cautious in adding tests that are overly complex as it will slow down the feedback cycle.

Continue reading here:

The importance of QA automation: 6 Things to know - TechGenyz