DKIS ALP Group Robotic Process Automation

2019: Submission of the robotic platform for business process management

On May 30, 2019 the ALP Group company (ALP-IS LLC, or DKIS) reported that its department of corporate information systems released an import-independent technology platform of robotization of processes (robotic process automation, or RPA). In the Russian market development of DKIS has big competitive advantage since it is easily integrated with products 1C, but at the same time can work and as an independent element of an information system of the customer. Development of ALP DKIS is of interest to any organizations interested in significant increase in efficiency of business processes and also qualities of management decisions due to automation of labor-consuming or mass routine transactions. Besides, application of the DKIS RPA platform removes sanctions risks, eliminates different manifestations of "a human factor" and complements with relevant functions products 1C for the large organizations.

The PRA DKIS platform supports two main scenarios of creation of program robots.

The most typical scenario practically does not require training or any special knowledge. The user (the business analyst or the employee of business division) independently configures robots, useful to it, selecting and arranging the modules performing these or those operations in the necessary sequence: opening of the websites, start of application programs, copying of information from the user interface software, accomplishment of requests to a DB, recognition of documents, creation of electronic documents, formation and sending e-mail, action with the electronic signature, etc. Actually, it creates the step-by-step instruction, and everything becomes literally in several clicks. The prepared set of such modules covers practically all real needs of staff of the modern enterprises. But if necessary it is easy to add to a system and other actions.

More qualified employees can not only use ready modules, but also describe difficult custom algorithms of separate actions and also automate the whole processes. Here one of the supported universal programming languages (PL) is already used, for May, 2019 it is Java or YaP supported by the.NET platform.

Depending on the nature of the performed operations, program robots of the DKIS RPA platform can or work in the automatic mode, completely excepting participation of the person, and can perform only draft work and transfer its results to officials for accomplishment of responsible actions.

A system has no obligatory binding to the 1C Platform that allows to use it together with almost any application software, including legacy solutions and doby avlyaempo, created by the customer independently or in interaction in the outsourcing companies. Growth of popularity of this method of development of crucial business software in 2018 became a steady trend of the Russian IT market.

At the same time, the functionality of integration with software of 1C for the large organizations is built in the DKIS RPA platform: objects 1C, the prepared modules for different actions with them will be recognized, and the robot can be executed as a part of the user interface of software products 1C. The last circumstance significantly simplifies implementation of the RPA platform in the Russian companies where many employee categories constantly work with software of 1C and got used to its user interface. Two options of automation of interaction of the program robot with software of 1C are supported: via the user interface of the last and through DBMS (using connectors 1C).

In the provided development of ALP Group much attention is paid to the instruments of control and management implemented at the level of the RPA platform. Detailed information for the retrospective analysis is automatically entered in the summary protocol (log) which can be investigated separately or together with logs of other software. Besides, the RPA platform allows to monitor that how many it and what robots is executed on what step of an algorithm they are what resources consume, etc. in real time. When using the corresponding tools it is easy to compare this information with data about a status of external programs with which robots interact (MS Outlook Excel etc.). In total means of recording and monitoring allow to administer thinly the system of program robots and to timely notice practically any emergency situations — still before they influence work of users.

Let's note that DKIS puts more than two years robotization of processes into practice — as at implementation of the systems of the class ERP and i-ERP at customers, and in the internal ALP Group projects on development of own enterprise management system. Dozens of program robots belonging to different aspects of work of the enterprise are during this time created: to management of finance, preparation for tenders and support of sales, personnel management, etc. All of them are in the mode of commercial operation. Originally these robots were implemented on one of the leading foreign RPA platforms, but the practician quickly showed that this way is not optimal for the Russian market. It is possible to refer high sanctions risks, orientation to the foreign proprietary software to its main shortcomings (in respect of integration tools and the prepared sets of actions) and also practical difficulties of integration into the corporate software of 1C, popular in our country. For overcoming all these restrictions DKIS created own RPA platform. After that earlier created program robots were postponed for it and passed operating experience about a year. For May, 2019 the ALP Group RPA platform is ready to full-scale application at the Russian enterprises.