Category Archives: Automation

DUBLIN, Oct. 27, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- The "Paint Process Automation Market by Offering, Purpose and Vertical and Type: Opportunity Analysis and Industry Forecast, 2021-2030" report has been added to ResearchAndMarkets.com's offering.

The global paint process automation market size was valued at $3.34 billion in 2020, and is projected to reach $9.22 billion by 2030, registering a CAGR of 11.7% from 2021 to 2030. Paint process automation is an advanced method of industrial painting processes. It includes usage of high-end machines and robots. It helps users to increase competitiveness, product quality, and workman safety.

Some of the prime drivers of the paint process automation industry are consistent painting results, cost-effective painting processes, and ability to meet industry-specific needs. These factors are estimated to propel the market growth rapidly during the forecast period. However, high installation cost acts as a major barrier for the paint process automation market growth. Contradictory, integration of advanced technologies with paint processes and its ability to meet sustainable goals create lucrative opportunities for the market growth during the forecast period.

The paint process automation market is segmented into offering, purpose, vertical, type, and region. On the basis of offering, it is fragmented into hardware, software, and services. The hardware is further sub-segmented into robots, controllers, atomizers, and others. The robot is again segmented into 4-axis, 6-axis, 7-axis, and others. Based on purpose, the market is segregated into interior and exterior. By vertical, the market is divided into automotive, aviation, agriculture, textile, furniture, pharmaceutical, electronics, construction, and others. By type, the market is divided into floor-mounted systems, wall-mounted systems, rail-mounted systems, and others. Region-wise, paint process automation market trends are analyzed across North America (the U.S., Canada, and Mexico), Europe (the UK, Germany, France, Italy, and Rest of Europe), Asia-Pacific (China, Japan, India, South Korea, and Rest of Asia-Pacific), and LAMEA (Latin America, the Middle East, and Africa).

Key Topics Covered:

Chapter 1: Introduction

CHAPTER 2: Executive summary

CHAPTER 3: MARKET OVERVIEW3.1. Market definition and scope3.2. Key forces shaping paint process automation market3.4. Market dynamics3.4.1. Drivers3.4.1.1. Paint process automation offers consistent results3.4.1.2. Cost-effective painting process3.4.1.3. Paint process automation meets industry-specific needs3.4.2. Restraint3.4.2.1. High installation cost3.4.3. Opportunities3.4.3.1. Integration of advanced technologies with painting robots3.4.3.2. Paint process automation is a step toward sustainability3.5. COVID-19 impact analysis on the paint process automation market3.5.1. Impact on market size3.5.2. End user trends, preferences, and budget impact3.5.3. Key player strategy3.5.3.1. Limited investments for R&D3.5.3.2. Focus on next-generation products3.5.3.3. Shift toward agile supply chain model3.5.4. Opportunity window due to COVID-19 outbreak3.5.5. Economic impact3.6. Market share analysis3.7. Value chain analysis3.8. Pricing analysis

CHAPTER 4: PAINT PROCESS AUTOMATION MARKET, By Offering4.1. Overview4.2. Hardware4.2.1. Key market trends, growth factors, and opportunities4.2.2. Robots4.2.2.1.4-axis4.2.2.2.6-axis4.2.2.3.7-axis4.2.2.4. Others4.2.3. Controllers4.2.4. Atomizers4.2.5. Others4.2.6. Market size and forecast, by region4.2.7. Market analysis, by country4.3. Software4.3.1. Key market trends, growth factors, and opportunities4.3.2. Market size and forecast, by region4.3.3. Market analysis, by country4.4. Services4.4.1. Key market trends, growth factors, and opportunities4.4.2. Market size and forecast, by region4.4.3. Market analysis, by country

CHAPTER 5: PAINT PROCESS AUTOMATION MARKET, By Purpose5.1. Overview5.2. Interior5.2.1. Key market trends, growth factors, and opportunities5.2.2. Market size and forecast, by region5.2.3. Market analysis, by country5.3. Exterior5.3.1. Key market trends, growth factors, and opportunities5.3.2. Market size and forecast, by region5.3.3. Market analysis, by country

CHAPTER 6: PAINT PROCESS AUTOMATION MARKET, By Vertical6.1. Overview6.2. Automotive6.2.1. Key market trends, growth factors, and opportunities6.2.2. Market size and forecast, by region6.2.3. Market analysis, by country6.3. Aviation6.3.1. Key market trends, growth factors, and opportunities6.3.2. Market size and forecast, by region6.3.3. Market analysis, by country6.4. Agriculture6.4.1. Key market trends, growth factors, and opportunities6.4.2. Market size and forecast, by region6.4.3. Market analysis, by country6.5. Textile6.5.1. Key market trends, growth factors, and opportunities6.5.2. Market size and forecast, by region6.5.3. Market analysis, by country6.6. Furniture6.6.1. Key market trends, growth factors, and opportunities6.6.2. Market size and forecast, by region6.6.3. Market analysis, by country6.7. Pharmaceutical6.7.1. Key market trends, growth factors, and opportunities6.7.2. Market size and forecast, by region6.7.3. Market analysis, by country6.8. Electronics6.8.1. Key market trends, growth factors, and opportunities6.8.2. Market size and forecast, by region6.8.3. Market analysis, by country6.9. Construction6.9.1. Key market trends, growth factors, and opportunities6.9.2. Market size and forecast, by region6.9.3. Market analysis, by country6.10. Others6.10.1. Key market trends, growth factors, and opportunities6.10.2. Market size and forecast, by region6.10.3. Market analysis, by country

CHAPTER 7: PAINT PROCESS AUTOMATION MARKET, By Type7.1. Overview7.2. Floor-mounted painting robots7.2.1. Key market trends, growth factors, and opportunities7.2.2. Market size and forecast, by region7.2.3. Market analysis, by country7.3. Wall-mounted painting robots7.3.1. Key market trends, growth factors, and opportunities7.3.2. Market size and forecast, by region7.3.3. Market analysis, by country7.4. Rail-mounted painting robots7.4.1. Key market trends, growth factors, and opportunities.7.4.2. Market size and forecast, by region7.4.3. Market analysis, by country7.5. Others7.5.1. Key market trends, growth factors, and opportunities7.5.2. Market size and forecast, by region7.5.3. Market analysis, by country

CHAPTER 8: PAINT PROCESS AUTOMATION MARKET, By Region

CHAPTER 9: COMPETITIVE LANDSCAPE9.1. Introduction9.1.1. Key player positioning, 20209.2. Competitive dashboard9.3. Competitive heatmap9.4. Product mapping9.5. Top winning strategies9.5.1. Top winning strategies, by year9.5.2. Top winning strategies, by development9.5.3. Top winning strategies, by company

CHAPTER 10: Company profiles10.1. ABB Ltd.10.1.1. Company overview10.1.2. Key executives10.1.3. Company snapshot10.1.4. Operating business segments10.1.5. Product portfolio10.1.6. R&D expenditure10.1.7. Business performance10.1.8. Key strategic moves and developments10.2. CMA Robotics Spa10.2.1. Company overview10.2.2. Key executives10.2.3. Company snapshot10.2.4. Operating business segments10.2.5. Product portfolio10.2.6. Business performance10.3. Durr AG10.3.1. Company overview10.3.2. Key executives10.3.3. Company snapshot10.3.4. Operating business segments10.3.5. Product portfolio10.3.6. R&D expenditure10.3.7. Business performance10.3.8. Key strategic moves and developments10.4. EPISTOLIO Srl10.4.1. Company overview10.4.2. Key executives10.4.3. Company snapshot10.4.4. Operating business segments10.4.5. Product portfolio10.4.6. Business performance10.5. FANUC Corporation10.5.1. Company overview10.5.2. Key executives10.5.3. Company snapshot10.5.4. Operating business segments10.5.5. Product portfolio10.5.6. Business performance10.5.7. Key strategic moves and developments10.6. Graco Inc.10.6.1. Company overview10.6.2. Key executives10.6.3. Company snapshot10.6.4. Operating business segments10.6.5. Product portfolio10.6.6. Business performance10.7. Kawasaki Heavy Industries, Ltd.10.7.1. Company overview10.7.2. Key executives10.7.3. Company snapshot10.7.4. Operating business segments10.7.5. Product portfolio10.7.6. R&D expenditure10.7.7. Business performance10.7.8. Key strategic moves and developments10.8. KUKA AG10.8.1. Company overview10.8.2. Key executives10.8.3. Company snapshot10.8.4. Operating business segments10.8.5. Product portfolio10.8.6. R&D expenditure10.8.7. Business performance10.8.8. Key strategic moves and developments10.9. Staubli International AG10.9.1. Company overview10.9.2. Key executives10.9.3. Company snapshot10.9.4. Operating business segments10.9.5. Product portfolio10.10. YASKAWA Electric Corporation10.10.1. Company overview10.10.2. Key executives10.10.3. Company snapshot10.10.4. Operating business segments10.10.5. Product portfolio10.10.6. R&D expenditure10.10.7. Business performance10.10.8. Key strategic moves and developments

For more information about this report visit https://www.researchandmarkets.com/r/z7dspv

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The Worldwide Paint Process Automation Industry is Expected to Reach $9.22 Billion by 2030 - PRNewswire

A typical enterprise grapples with hundreds or thousands of agreements, contracts and other legal documents every year, and it usually engages costly legal counsel either inside or outside the company to assess those documents on their behalf. Now, a startup called InCloudCounsel that is part RPA and part BPO it has built tools to both automate and, in some cases, outsource this work is announcing a Series B round of $200 million, money that it will be using to meet demand for its services.

Alongside this, the startup is rebranding to Ontra signifying getting to the heart of contracts, according to the startups CEO and founder Troy Pospisil.

The round is being led by Blackstone Growth (the growth equity business of the investment giant), with previous backer Battery Ventures and board member Mike Paulus (who previously ran and sold Assurance IQ to Prudential, and before that was an investor with Andreessen Horowitz). Valuation is not being disclosed, but prior to this, in July 2019, the company raised $40 million in a round led by Battery a sum that had previously been undisclosed until today.

The company is not talking about its valuation, but as a marker of what kinds of companies Ontra is targeting and working with, Blackstone is a strategic and financial investor in this round: Blackstone MD Paul Morrissey tells me that the firm is a strong user of Ontras tech to filter through thousands of NDAs and other contracts that it issues and receives every year, where the technology uses AI techniques like NLP to essentially guard Blackstones interests, scanning documents for items that are unusual or might need modifying ahead of being signed, and then passing on those documents to human lawyers for final checks. In all, Ontra is processing some 20,000 NDAs monthly at the moment.

Pospisil said he first came up with the idea for Ontra when he was working as an investment specialist at HIG Capital, where he saw how the need to triage large volumes of contracts would slow down deals and other important transactions that the company was making. HIG would have a large legal counsel on board to handle work, but even so it needed to rely on outside organizations to complement and supplement that.

Even simple contracts needed to be recorded and catalogued, he recalled. We would send these to a law firm, or we might staff up a team, but no one was using any technology to track what they were doing. There was no visibility into what is where, whether data is lost in the process. This coveredlong, complex agreements; important contracts and credit agreements, he said. All these were incredibly complicated.

It was 2014, and he was living in San Francisco and seeing a lot of interesting business models such as Ubers emerging that gave him an idea to, in his words, combine tech and a labor model to solve the problem.

Ontras approach thus encompasses two parts. First, tapping into innovations were happening in the wider world of document management processing, it uses natural language and other algorithmic techniques to speed up the processing of large amounts of documentation faster and more efficiently than a human might do it. You might think of this as akin to a kind of very specialized version of robotic process automation.

That document processing work, in turn, is then handed over to the second part of the Ontra platform, its crowdsourced network of lawyers. Essentially, following the Uber and others model of bringing in gig workers to handle jobs on demand, Ontra has amassed a team of legal professionals typically corporate lawyers who either provide some hours to Ontra in a side-gig if they are not already working full time, or in some cases as a small way to earn money using their skill at a time when they may be doing something else (or, not working at all). Pospisil said that in cases where a company might have their own in-house teams, they might also use Ontra just for the processing side to expedite work, but as a general rule, customers are taking the full package.

This is like payroll, he said. You dont want to be doing it internally if its not strategically important to what you want to be doing as a business.

Ontra interestingly has not yet come up against legal firms that might see it as competition.

We were a little worried that we would be considered competition to the law firms, but they really like us, he said. They dont want to be doing this work, either. They are focusing on larger M&A transactions and supporting the company. The world has this weird idea that legal work always needs to be sent to a law firm, but its not always efficient to do that, and lawyers are too expensive to do that. Its not right-sized.

Morrissey at Blackstone believes that the future lies in continuing to pursue the two sides of the business model, with the lawyer network an important complement to what is at heart a tech company, with more software being added all the time.

Its hard to underestimate the tech they have built, he said, which is partly there in aid of making its network of lawyers much more efficient. It means Ontra is also improving the workflow for them, with analytics that essentially say focus on this and not other things in a contract. The company also offers a full invoicing platform for the legal market, he said, similar to the piece Uber has built for consumers so that drivers get paid and dont have to worry about anything else.

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InCloudCounsel raises $200M, rebrands as Ontra to expand its automation tools for contract management - TechCrunch

The trend toward automation predates the COVID-19 pandemic but has accelerated in recent months as enterprises looked for ways to limit in-person professional interactions, improve processes with work-at-home mandates, and increase efficiency to face the economic crisis.

Given the proven potential of automation to improve business outcomes, it is likely to continue to expand and establish itself as a must-have boardroom conversation, according to Irving L. Dennis (pictured, left), retired Ernst & Young Global Ltd. partner and former chief financial officer of the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development.

The way I think of it from a boards conversation is if a company doesntthink of itself as a technology company in all aspects, no matter what you do,you are a technology company or you need to be, he said. And if youre not thinking along that way, youre going to lose market share and youre going to start falling behind your competitors.

Dennis and James Matcher (pictured, right), consulting principal, Americas intelligent automation leader, at EY, spoke with Dave Vellante and Lisa Martin, co-host of theCUBE, SiliconANGLE Medias livestreaming studio, during UiPaths Forward IV conference. They discussed how automation has become a major enabler for business to achieve their strategic ambitions, why it is important to make intelligent automation a board-level narrative, and the beneficial impact of board-level support. (* Disclosure below.)

While gaining the attention of companies, automation itself is undergoing a transformation. It has evolved from generation one, which was a very robotic process automation-centrictype of automation, to generation two, which is the combined integration of multiple technologies targeting internal process, according to Matcher. Now, its reached generation three, where the technology has started to spread through the organization.

The ability to be able to look at processes more deeply toautomate them in an end-to-end process, collectively, and use these different technologies in a synergisticmanner truly becomes powerful, because it shifts the narrative from a microprocess agenda into more systemic area, Matcher explained.

How organizations keep pace with this evolution varies widely by industry. While the private sector is between generations two and three, governments are behind in this process by about three or four years, according to Dennis.

Even within the private sector, theres plenty of room to drive innovation, which is why its important to make intelligent automation a board-level narrative.

I would personally put it in enterprise risk management from a standpoint that if youre notfocused on it, its going to be a risk to the enterprise, Dennis concluded.

Watch the complete video interview below, and be sure to check out more of SiliconANGLEs and theCUBEs coverage of during UiPaths Forward IV conference. (* Disclosure: TheCUBE is a paid media partner for the UiPaths Forward IV conference. Neither UiPath Inc., the sponsor for theCUBEs event coverage, nor other sponsors have editorial control over content on theCUBE or SiliconANGLE.)

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Automation becomes a board imperative to drive business efficiency and innovation - SiliconANGLE News

LONDON--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Ryan, a leading global tax services and software provider, today announced it has entered into a partnership with Alteryx, Inc. (NYSE: AYX), the Analytics Automation company, improving its ability to deliver complex and innovative tax data transformation and automation solutions to clients. The partnership further enhances Ryans ability delivering technology-enabled transformation, helping clients around the globe improve business outcomes by transforming day-to-day manual tax processes into powerfully simple, automated solutions.

Under the partnership, Ryan and Alteryx will work together offering bespoke tax transformation services, bringing together the power and flexibility of the Alteryx Platform with Ryans market-leading tax, transformation, and automation skills. Clients will benefit from Ryans deep knowledge and expertise of how Alteryx is best used alongside other existing systems. Continuing Ryans mission to be its clients single tax transformation partner, the alliance with Alteryx brings together an innovative code-free and code-friendly, self-service data analytics and process automation platform with industry leading, hands-on tax transformation delivery experts.

Understanding that tax functions need to digitise and modernise their tax processes is only the first step. The key challenge is figuring out how to get started and how to integrate change into current tax workflows, said Andrew Burman, Ryan Principal, Tax Technology. With the Alteryx partnership, our clients have full flexibility on pace and scope of how they can embark on their tax transformation journey with Ryan.

We recognise Ryans strong reputation and proven success providing innovative tax transformation projects to high-profile organisations, and we value these traits in a partner, said Barb Huelskamp, Senior Vice President, Global Partners and Alliances of Alteryx. Financial and tax operations across the globe are increasingly leveraging analytics and automation to deliver business breakthroughs, and weve seen this area grow as a key driver of interest in Alteryx. We are excited to work with a market-leading partner such as Ryan, combining their knowledge with the Alteryx Platform helping our customers deliver ground-breaking tax transformations on a global scale.

Improving the efficiency and effectiveness of our clients people, processes, data, and systems to transform their tax function into a best practice environment is our main objective, said Jon C. Sweet, Ryan President of European and Asia-Pacific Operations. Ryan has always had a flexible approach, delivering custom solutions to meet our clients needs without incurring audit independence issues, and this new partnership with Alteryx clearly provides additional value to Ryans services, while maximising the value we deliver to our clients.

About Alteryx

Alteryx, the Analytics Automation company, is focused on enabling every person to transform data into a breakthrough. Alteryx unifies analytics, data science, and business process automation in one, end-to-end platform to accelerate digital transformation and shape the future of analytic process automation (APA). Organisations of all sizes, all over the world, rely on Alteryx to deliver high-impact business outcomes and the rapid upskilling of their modern workforce. For more information, visit http://www.alteryx.com. Alteryx is a registered trademark of Alteryx, Inc. All other product and brand names may be trademarks or registered trademarks of their respective owners.

About Ryan

Ryan, an award-winning global tax services and software provider, is the largest Firm in the world dedicated exclusively to business taxes. The Firm provides an integrated suite of international tax services on a multijurisdictional basis, including tax recovery, consulting, advocacy, compliance, and technology services. Ryan is a nine-time recipient of the International Service Excellence Award from the Customer Service Institute of America (CSIA) for its commitment to world-class client service. Empowered by the dynamic myRyan work environment, which is widely recognised as the most innovative in the tax services industry, Ryans multidisciplinary team of more than 3,100 professionals and associates serves over 18,000 clients in more than 60 countries, including many of the worlds most prominent Global 5000 companies. More information about Ryan can be found at ryan.com/europe. Ryan and Firm refer to the global organisational network and may refer to one or more of the member firms of Ryan International, each of which is a separate legal entity.

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Ryan and Alteryx Enter Partnership to Enhance Tax Function Automation - Business Wire

TORONTO--(BUSINESS WIRE)--SoftwareReviews, a division of IT research and advisory firm Info-Tech Research Group, has published its 2021 Marketing Automation - Enterprise Software Data Quadrant Awards, naming four vendors as gold medalists. The following vendors are winners according to the feedback provided by their end-users via SoftwareReviews comprehensive online survey:

Vendors are rated on product features, vendor capabilities, and the relationship with their software partner.

What makes the SoftwareReviews Data Quadrant different?

The study involves gathering intelligence on user satisfaction with both product features and the experience with the vendor. Aggregated emotional response ratings are included in the areas of service, negotiation, product impact, conflict resolution, and strategy and innovation to create a powerful indicator of overall user feeling toward the vendor and its product all from the software users point of view. SoftwareReviews calls this insight the Net Emotional Footprint.

With a Net Emotional Footprint of +92, Acoustic Campaign ranked strongly for including quality features. HubSpot Marketing Hub received a Net Emotional Footprint of +88 and exceeded user expectations by having quality training for their users. ActiveCampaign received a Net Emotional Footprint of +86 by including a breadth of features. Adobe Marketo Engage received a Net Emotional Footprint of +83 by having outstanding task and alert automation features.

Marketing Automation Software users were most satisfied with vendors email marketing automation. However, users would be happy to see more features to automate social media activities.

In-depth product evaluation reports are available at http://www.softwarereviews.com

About SoftwareReviews Data Quadrant Awards and Software Reports:

SoftwareReviews Data Quadrant Awards recognize outstanding vendors in the technology marketplace as evaluated by their users annually. Top vendors in a software category are eligible to receive Data Quadrant Gold Medals, provided their net-promoter scores meet the threshold for sufficiently high user satisfaction across four areas of evaluation: vendor capabilities, product features, likeliness to recommend, and vendor experience.

About SoftwareReviews:

SoftwareReviews is a division of Info-Tech Research Group, an IT research and advisory firm established in 1997. Backed by two decades of IT research and advisory experience, SoftwareReviews is a leading source of expertise and insight into the enterprise software landscape and client-vendor relationships. By collecting real data from IT and business professionals, the SoftwareReviews methodology produces detailed and authentic insights into the experience of evaluating and purchasing enterprise software.

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Best Marketing Automation - Enterprise Software Revealed by Users Through SoftwareReviews - Business Wire

Estimated reading time 4 minutes, 41 seconds.

Robinson Helicopter Company plans to integrate an advanced flight automation system from Skyryse into its R66 helicopter, making it possible for almost anyone to safely control the aircraft with touchscreen tablets and a joystick.

According to Skyryse, Robinson is one of five aircraft original equipment manufacturers (OEMs) to establish partnerships with the Los Angeles-based technology company for itsFlightOS product, which will enable anyone to fly as safely as the best pilots on their best day.

Although Skyryse didnt reveal the others, it said that the OEMs collectively produce over half of the worlds new general aviation aircraft.

The general aviation industry is about to change forever, Skyryse founder and CEO Dr. Mark Groden declared in a press release. Were on a mission to empower anyone to fly anywhere in any aircraft as safely as the most experienced pilots in the world. Our technology will usher in a new era of mobility, from fighting fires in remote areas to relieving traffic in crowded cities.

Skyryse said its fly-by-wire hardware and software package can be integrated into any aircraft. It has been conducting flight testing in helicopters including a Robinson R44, which actor Jon Hamm is shown flying in the companyslatest video. Although Hamm is shown controlling the aircraft with Apple iPads, Skyryse toldTechCrunchthat its finished product will use aviation certified touchscreens.

According to Skyryse, its technology protects the pilot from exiting the flight envelope, is equipped with terrain and obstacle avoidance, and can safely manage the aircraft through emergencies, including power failures. Last month, the company said, a Skyryse-enabled helicopter autonomously entered an autorotation and controlled the descent while gliding to earth without engine power or pilot intervention.

This week, the companyannounced US$200 million in Series B funding, bringing its total capital raised to date to $250 million. The Series B round was led by Fidelity Management & Research Company and Monashee Investment Management, with participation by a number of new and existing investors.

Skyryse has also brought on two new advisors to help guide its Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) certification process, including former FAA head Michael Huerta and former National Transportation Safety Board chairman Chris Hart. Both highlighted the potential for Skyryses technology to achieve dramatic gains in aviation safety.

Said Hart: This is a breakthrough that the aviation industry has been waiting for to make air transportation accessible to everyone at safety levels that were previously attainable only on commercial airlines.

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Skyryse to supply advanced flight automation to Robinson Helicopter - Vertical Magazine

PALO ALTO, Calif.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Uniphore, the leader in Conversational Automation, today announced its Uniphore Unite partner program to support a rapidly expanding market that is seeing the benefits of using Artificial Intelligence (AI) and automation technology to significantly improve customer experience (CX).

Uniphore Unite is a robust partner program that includes essential resources to support the partner lifecycle end-to-end and enables partners to leverage Uniphores best-of-breed, innovative technology to expand their portfolio and profitability. Uniphore provides a unique value proposition that combines improved CX along with a great return-on-investment, increasing customer satisfaction while driving cost savings. Customers can now view and take advantage of the services expertise, capabilities, and complementary technology of the partners in Uniphores Unite program to achieve these returns.

Uniphore has always been committed to building a robust partner ecosystem to support our customers. With the launch of Uniphore Unite, we enhance the value of our industry-leading AI and automation solutions by partnering with world-class services and complementary technology firms, said Jafar Syed, SVP, Global Head of Channel Alliances & Partnerships at Uniphore. Uniphore Unite provides structure and foundation for enhanced partner collaboration and will facilitate the creation of a strong community built around the mission to transform CX across the board.

Uniphore Unite offers a range of programs to support each partners business model, including referral, resell, managed services, co-selling, and services, delivering the resources this global community needs for success.

There are three program levels in the reseller and Business Process Outsourcer (BPO) programs, providing support for partners of all sizes:

Partners who join Uniphore Unite will benefit from the program in numerous ways, including:

The launch of Uniphore Unite is yet another milestone indicative of Uniphores accelerating momentum in the market. In addition to its latest $150M Series D funding that was announced in March 2021, Uniphore has announced numerous product innovations and two acquisitions so far this year the acquisition of Emotion Research Labs and Jacada. With the acquisition of Jacada, Uniphore is the leading vendor that can truly deliver front and back-office automation across every customer and agent interaction by optimizing every conversation and delivering it in a simplified, business user friendly UX environment and desktop.

Uniphore Unite will enable the companys global partners and their customers to take full advantage of this innovative platform.

To apply to Uniphore Unite, visit: https://unite.uniphore.com/

For more information about Uniphore and its solutions, visit: http://www.uniphore.com.

About Uniphore

Uniphore is the global leader in Conversational Automation. Every day, billions of conversations take place across industries customer service, sales, HR, education and more. Whether they are human to human, human to machine or machine to machine, conversations are at the heart of everything we do, and the new currency of the enterprise.

At Uniphore, we believe companies that best understand and take action on those conversations will win. We have built the most comprehensive and powerful conversational automation platform that combines conversational AI, workflow automation and RPA (Robotic Process Automation) with a business user friendly UX in a single integrated platform to transform and democratize customer experiences across industries.

Follow our blog and connect with us on LinkedIn, Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram.

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Uniphore Announces Uniphore Unite Partner Program to Accelerate Global AI and Automation Innovation - Business Wire

Hybrid workplaces have continued to be necessary into the closing months of 2021 as the COVID-19 pandemic continues, but all indications are that this new way of working will stick around long after the health risks necessitating it have faded.

The digital workplace that remote and hybrid work requires is an ecosystem of different technology and service capabilities more than it is a single "thing" or product, said Adam Holtby, principal analyst of mobile workspace with Omdia. Automation tools have an important role to play in that model of working, with McKinsey finding that two-thirds of companies accelerated the use of automation and AI since the pandemic began in March 2020.

That pandemic embrace of new digital tools fit in with digital transformations already underway at many organizations, and will continue post-pandemic for example, a PwC survey found that half of CFOs plan to accelerate automation and the digital workforce once workers can return to the office.

Automation lies at the heart of transformation, and businesses are going to continue making significant investments in intelligent systems and infrastructure to support the pace of change that the digital age mandates, said Hansa Iyengar, principal analyst of enterprise IT strategy with Omdia.

When it comes to the tools that make those digital workplace transformations possible, three areas stand out as priorities: legacy modernization, technical support and cloud-based infrastructure.

On the journey to digital transformation, legacy systems can be a boulder in the middle of the road. They can be slow and inefficient, unable to deal with modern data and security needs, and incompatible with sophisticated analysis and automation tools.

The biggest pain point is the huge amount of technical debt that lies hidden in legacy systems, and the fact that so far businesses have been doing lip service to digitalization by painting APIs and microservices architectures over legacy systems without actually doing anything to retire them, Iyengar said.

Investments in modernizing and/or replacing legacy systems are happening. The 2020 SIM IT Trends Study found that replacing and replatforming legacy apps was among the top 10 largest IT investments for organizations from 2009 to 2019. Now more than ever, enterprises have realized that legacy technologies are a hurdle that will prevent them from reaping the full benefits of digital unless they retire them, Iyengar said.

One thing I have certainly seen is a surge in priority around improving technical support activities, of which automation will be an important element, Holtby said.

Automation in IT and technical support services isnt new, he said. However, the pandemic made the conversation more urgent, especially given the challenges faced by these teams in supporting employees. Improving and streamlining those support services is one way to improve employee satisfaction with and success in hybrid and remote work arrangements that many workers already want to hold on to. For example, a CNBC/SurveyMonkey report found that remote workers showed higher overall job satisfaction, and many of them wanted to continue to work from home at least part of the time.

If organizations want to support their employees desires for continued remote work, solid technical support tools will be important and automation can increase their availability and success. I see self-service, automating workflows/processes that guide support activities and self-heal capabilities/solutions all being of key interest to IT teams, Holtby said.

For obvious reasons related to remote and hybrid work arrangements, cloud computing investments have increased during the pandemic. A Society for Information Management study released early this year found that cloud computing was the top organizational investment for the first time in a decade.

Hybrid cloud automation brings together two powerful digital transformation support tools, further building success in the digital workplace. Tools such as IBMs Cloud Pak for Automation allow for the integration of robotic process automation (RPA) in the hybrid workplace, for example, and Azure Automation allows for both cloud and on-site resource management.

Automation-focused tools like these will continue to become important as organizations evaluate how the workplace looks going forward while continuing with their digital transformation strategies. It looks like COVID-19 will continue to impact normal life through 2022, Iyengar said, but enterprise investments will continue nonetheless.

This will not change, pandemic or not, as these are not investments that can be turned off, she said. Doing so will harm the business.

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Automation Tools Needed for the New Hybrid Workplace - ITPro Today

Ahead of the release of the HIMSS APAC CIO report in November, an expert panel at the HIMSS21 APAC Conference discussed problems confronting health CIOs today and shared solutions to resolve them.

The panel comprised Kuroda Tomohiro, CIO and Medical Information Technology and Administration Planning Division Director at Kyoto University Hospital in Japan; Alistair Vickers, CIO at Tu Ora Primary Health Organisation in New Zealand; and HIMSS UK Chief Clinical Officer Dr Charles Alessi.

In the upcoming report, five key trends among health organisations in Asia-Pacific were identified: strengthening cybersecurity; adoption of care delivery models that enable self-management of health and wellness; analytics at the core of organisations' work and processes; reliance on automation; and high digital literacy among the workforce.

Among these trends, health leaders from New Zealand and Japan both said they are prioritising the digital literacy of their workforce.

Kuroda emphasised its relevance in Japan given that most health systems there are "conservative" and that health workers are "too busy" to take in new information. What they did, he said, is to simplify instructions on handling new systems.

Tu Ora moved staff to the cloud and trained them with communication platforms when COVID-19 started spreading globally. "It was just beautifully timed that we were able to help them through that modality of working remotely," Vickers shared.

Meanwhile, he also pointed out that those key trends "interlink" with one another. "If you don't train [staff] properly to use [digital] tools, the chances of cyber incidents increase. If you want to get technology out to patients and help them manage their own health more actively, this [also] concerns data literacy," he explained.

Analytics is also one area where Kyoto University Hospital is focused. Kuroda said they have been trying to implement IoT devices into the hospital's system. Although they are burdened with the cost of deploying such technology, it nonetheless helped with decreasing workload, especially in diagnostics.

On the other hand, Tu Ora is working to collaborate with other stakeholders in New Zealand's health ecosystem to come together and share data to generate major insights that will address major inequities in the country's healthcare system.

In terms of technology, the primary care provider has moved to a centralised data warehouse paradigm hosted on Microsoft Azure while the Japanese university hospital has put in place separate analytics tools for its clinical side and research and epidemiology.

On automation, Vickers shared that they have automated the processes around claims and payments, which has helped ensure quicker and more accurate payments. They are prioritising those areas where automation and analytics can add real value in care delivery.

At the close of the panel discussion, Dr Alessi concluded that across care settings, "the trends are inevitably going to be the same as we move into this multimodal new digital age".

The HIMSS21 APAC Conference took place on 18 and 19 October. All sessions can be accessed on-demand by registeringhere. If you have already registered, log inhere.

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Digital literacy, automation among key priorities of APAC health CIOs - Healthcare IT News

Alan Miller, engineering manager and product manager for Big Kaiser, said in a September 28, 2021 webinar that improvements to collaborative robot systems have opened up automation to a wider array of manufacturers than ever before. Between these cobots and automation-optimized tooling, manufacturers can now automate smaller, specific, repetitive operations with less investment in time and resources. This frees up operators to tackle high-complexity operations that require manual input, while speeding up productivity and improving safety in simpler tasks.

Collaborative robots, or cobots, widen the range of processes compatible with automation. Cobots are designed to work alongside employees, with integrated safety features like force limits automatically stopping the cobots when they meet unexpected resistance. Improved speed control, vision systems and proximity sensors, coding simplicity and increased adaptability also enhance the functionality of these automation solutions.

As part of encouraging the use of cobots, tool manufacturers like Big Kaiser have developed optimized solutions to take advantage of their increased functionality.

The gripper of Big Kaisers Unilock workholding systemis optimized for use with cobots. It was designed to eliminate the tight diameter and spacing control problems of retention knobs, which had prevented automation with earlier generations of zero-point workholding. Images courtesy of Big Kaiser.

Miller points out four applications where Big Kaiser has developed tooling to support the automation revolution: workholding, grinding work driving, cleaning and fine boring.

The companys Unilock workholding solution includes several optimizations specifically for use with automation. Miller says the chuck mounts directly to the machine tool (as well as other places, if needed), with a single reference point for fixtures or loading parts.

Miller also says that traditional zero-point workholding systems with tight diameters and spacing controls on the retention knobs can be difficult for robots to unload. Using a robot on these systems can lead to the workholding devices locking up or not fully coming out.

To combat this, Big Kaiser flipped the system inside out for automation. The chucks from its NSA Series have the clamping systems and tapers on the table Miller compares this to what would be underneath the pallet of a horizontal milling machine. Flat, round pucks go underneath the work pallet, where Miller says they can easily slide on and off to improve the systems compatibility with robots. The system uses a central chuck, but users can attach four additional locator plates to have built-in angular positioning while loading the chuck.

Traditionally, grinding work drivers need to be manually attached to each work piece, so automation would take the form of preassembled parts with attached work drivers. Miller says Big Kaisers line of mechanically actuated grinding work drivers instead uses spindle rotation to lock and unlock the drive, with adjustable jaws swinging into place and grabbing onto the workpiece.

Cobots are more compatible with this mechanically activated system, and can facilitate automated loading and unloading of small shafts. If the cobot runs into any problems, rather than proceeding to cause damage like a traditional robot, it stops and waits for an operator to assess the issue.

Keeping the work area clean is critical to successful automation project, Miller says. Big Kaiser recommends two ways to automate this task: the chip fan and the chip blower. The chip fan is a fixed and balanced blade fan with a small, 125-mm diameter that requires high spindle speeds to be effective, while the chip blower is a folding blade fan that covers more area at lower speeds making it suitable for larger machines and tables.

The EWA fine boring head offers automated adjustments and cutting insert wear compensation. The level of automation can be set to the users comfort, from adjustments to user-input values to fully automated boring from the machine tool control.

New opportunities for automation are not limited to cobot-optimized workholding. Miller says Big Kaiser wants to enable full automation of the fine boring process.

Removing the need for manual adjustment could reduce cycle times and the risk of human error while also improving operator safety. The companys EWA line of finish boring heads, scheduled for release in early 2022, moves toward this goal with an internal motor for automatic tool carrier adjustments, an internal actuator for clamping the tool carrier, and Bluetooth to communicate with external devices.

Automatic cutting insert wear compensation features adjust the boring tool for potential wear compensation based on measurements from the machine touch probe and bore gauge. Automatic adjustments can also enable a single tool to bore multiple hole sizes.

Bluetooth connectivity enables differing levels of automation, depending on the users comfort. Similarly to the EWE, the EWA can connect to users smartphones and tablets. In this situation, the machine operator inputs adjustment values in the app, then the tool adjusts automatically to the set value. This keeps the operators knowledge of fine boring in play, while still benefiting from the automated adjustments safety and tooling benefits.

Connection to an external computer that is itself connected to the machine enables the boring heads probe to transfer measurements to the computer. From here, the computer can command the EWA boring head for adjustments. This system automates the boring head, while still keeping it separate from the machine tool control.

Direct connection with the machine uses Bluetooth to enable the machine to control the EWA boring heads adjustments. Miller says Big Kaiser is actively working with companies to develop in-machine apps that improve compatibility with this automation method.

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Putting Production on Repeat with Machine Tool Automation - Modern Machine Shop