Gartner says low-code, RPA, and AI driving growth in ‘hyperautomation’

Research firm Gartner estimates the market for hyperautomation-enabling technologies will reach $596 billion in 2022, up nearly 24% from the $481.6 billion in 2020.

Gartner is expecting significant growth for technology that enables organizations to rapidly identify, vet, and automate as many processes as possible and says it will become a “condition of survival” for enterprises. Hyperautomation-enabling technologies include robotic process automation (RPA), low-code application platforms (LCAP), AI, and virtual assistants.

As organizations look for ways to automate the digitization and structuring of data and content, technologies that automate content ingestion, such as signature verification tools, optical character recognition, document ingestion, conversational AI, and natural language technology (NLT), will be in high demand. For example, these tools could be used to automate the process of digitizing and sorting paper records.

Gartner currently anticipates the hyperautomation market reaching $532.4 billion this year.

Drivers of growth

Gartner said process-agnostic tools such as RPA, LCAP, and AI will drive the hyperautomation trend because organizations can use them across multiple use cases. Even though they constitute a small part of the overall market, their impact will be significant, with Gartner projecting 54% growth in these process-agnostic tools.

Through 2024, the drive toward hyperautomation will lead organizations to adopt at least three out of the 20 process-agonistic types of software that enable hyperautomation, Gartner said.

The demand for low-code tools is already high as skills-strapped IT organizations look for ways to move simple development projects over to business users. Last year, Gartner forecast that three-quarters of large enterprises would use at least four low-code development tools by 2024 and that low-code would make up more than 65% of application development activity.

Software automating specific tasks, such as enterprise resource planning (ERP), supply chain management, and customer relationship management (CRM), will also contribute to the market’s growth, Gartner said.

Lots of potential use cases

Hyperautomation extends the idea of intelligent automation, as it promises end-to-end process automation with minimal human intervention required. The convergence of intelligent process automation technologies and cloud computing, along with the need to process unstructured content, helps make the case for hyperautomation across several industries, including shared services, hospitality, logistics, and real estate.

Some day-to-day examples of automation include self-driving cars, self-checkouts at grocery stores, smart home assistants, and appliances. Business use cases include applying data and machine learning to build predictive analytics that react to consumer behavior changes and implementing RPA to streamline operations on a manufacturing floor.

Gartner earlier included hyperautomation in its Top 10 Strategic Technology Trends for 2021.

Benefits of hyperautomation

Gartner said tools that provide visibility to map business activities, automate and manage content ingestion, orchestrate work across multiple systems, and provide complex rule engines make up the fastest-growing category of hyperautomation-enabling software. Organizations will be able to lower operational costs 30% by 2024 through combining hyperautomation technologies with redesigned operational processes, Garner projected.

“Hyperautomation has shifted from an option to a condition of survival,” Gartner VP Fabrizio Biscotti said in a statement. “Organizations will require more IT and business process automation as they are forced to accelerate digital transformation plans in a post-COVID-19, digital-first world.”