What Is Cloud Pak for Business Automation?

There is no doubt that automation is changing how we interact with the world around us. You only need to look around your home to see examples of automation affecting how you do things every day. Back in the early days, the act of preparing a meal was a long, laborious process – washing, chopping, blending, mixing, or cooking was done by hand and the process would require the full attention of the cook. Nowadays, what you see is a set of automation tools around the kitchen – such as a blender, drink mixer, oven, microwave, rice cooker, slow cooker, and pressure cooker – which quickly simplifies and reduces the effort and attention required so that the cook can now focus on something else – such as looking after a child, working on a hobby, or tending to the garden.

In the business world, this is no different. A recent survey done by McKinsey showed that the COVID-19 pandemic has sped up the adoption of digital technologies by several years. A core aspect of digital transformation is to introduce automation to streamline the workflow and decision-making process of the business’s employees.

Similarly, another survey was done by the IBM Institute of Business Value, where 1,500 executives from around the world were surveyed as part of the Future of Work Study in 2020. Here, the correspondents indicated that in 3 years, the two most important elements to gain competitive advantages would be customer experience and workforce skills. When asked about where they would be invested, more than half planned to increase AI investments, 44 percent to increase the usage of robotics, and over 73 percent expected that implementing Intelligent Automation (IA) would result in revenue growth.

In this chapter, we’ll be covering the following topics:

• IA and digital transformation – definitions and key motivations for leveraging IA to accelerate the digital transformation of the organization.
• IBM Cloud Pak for Business Automation – overview of Cloud Pak and its main capabilities
• Why Cloud Pak for Business Automation? – key reasons for choosing Cloud Pak
• Low-Code and Business Automation Studio – the focus on Low-Code for building your solution
• Solution architecture – overview of what a typical solution architecture might look like