Driving the Outsourcing Industry’s Evolution with RPA
The outsourcing industry traditionally played an enormous role in helping organizations cut costs, save time, and focus on core tasks. Offshore, nearshore, or onshore, BPO (business process outsourcing) companies all over the globe help handle repetitive, manual tasks such as accounting, IT, digital marketing, development, HR, and customer support services. According to Super Staff, the Americas had a total contract value of $76.7 billion; Europe, the Middle East, and Africa had $26.8 billion; Asia and Oceania had $11.5 billion as of 2019. However, with rapidly changing times, the traditional labor arbitrage model is becoming obsolete.
According to Deloitte's Global Outsourcing Survey in 2019, most organizations (72 percent) are considering or adopting RPA. Of respondents using RPA, approximately one-third are also implementing cognitive automation, while another 59 percent plan to do so within the next 18 months. However, technologies are on the rise, replacing manual labor. RPA (robotic process automation), software that can emulate human operations on a PC, is reducing costs and more efficient, and more accurate than traditional outsourcing, allowing enterprises to automate repetitive processes. Thus, many companies prefer RPA to traditional outsourcing. However, BPOs need not view RPA as a competitor but rather as an ally that can help the outsourcing industry adapt and grow. Here at Laiye, we offer Laiye UiBot, an RPA product that can help BPO businesses gain a competitive edge and adapt to changing circumstances.
What problems do traditional BPO businesses face?
BPO businesses offer many different services such as HR, accounting, IT, and so on. However, all of them are similar in that they specialize in completing mundane, repetitive tasks. With automation on the rise, however, manual labor pales in comparison.
- High labor costs. The top countries to outsource to are India, China, and Malaysia, due to their low labor costs. However, with wages on the rise, BPOs no longer have access to cheap labor. This is a problem considering how BPOs typically require a large workforce to perform menial, boring tasks.
- Inefficiencies. Anything that involves manual labor is subject to inefficiencies. Human workers cannot work 24/7 and are also subject to stress, fatigue, and emotions.
- Inaccuracies. Wherever humans are involved, there is room for error. For tedious tasks that have to be performed a thousand times a day, human error is an inevitable reality.
- Lack of security. Outsourcing comes with the risk of security breaches or data leaks, which can often result from human carelessness or error.
- Inconsistent quality. The quality of the service provided depends on the employee who delivered it. This can mean clients receive different quality services from the same company, which is inconsistent.
- Competition with technological alternatives. As technology such as RPA and chatbot services grow, some BPO businesses' clients are choosing to outsource to the software rather than to human beings. If BPOs still wish to have a competitive edge, then their services must reflect the newest technological advancements.
How can Laiye UiBot help?
The outsourcing industry is undergoing evolution. Though there is fear that technological advancements will be an obstacle for BPO businesses, RPA can actually boost the outsourcing industry and help it adapt to changing times. In other words, RPA can help BPO businesses keep their competitive edge and continue providing quality services to their clients.
Laiye UiBot is an RPA product which can help BPO businesses become more cost-effective, efficient, and accurate. Working 24/7 all year round, Laiye UiBot is tireless, allowing BPO businesses to allocate manual tasks to robots instead of humans. The bots work with near-perfect accuracy—over 95%—and can work at speeds up to many times of a human being with uniform consistency. Accurate and efficient, bots can replace human labor on repetitive, rule-based tasks such as manual data entry, querying, data extraction, form filling, and so on. Resultantly, BPO businesses can have a smaller workforce and save labor costs, enabling them to offer more competitive pricing to their clients.
Moreover, Laiye UiBot can help BPO businesses maintain tighter security, making sure to complete compliance checks and reconciliation. With higher accuracy and security, BPO businesses that use Laiye UiBot have a competitive advantage as they can offer the latest and greatest technology to their clients.
Now that employees are free from manual labor, BPO businesses can diversify their services and allocate more of their employees to tasks that require human creativity and talent, such as strategizing, planning, and, in the case of front-office tasks like customer support, resolving complex, unique consumer requests.
Of course, BPO businesses offer a variety of services like human resources, inventory, sales and marketing, operations, and more. For specific use cases, please visit our website ui.bot to read more.
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In just one or two hours with the help from our professional team, you can start building your own RPA bots using Laiye UiBot. It's time for the outsourcing industry to evolve and embrace the technological advancements that can enhance the services they offer.
About Laiye
Laiye, founded in 2015 by Ivy League Ph.D. graduates, is committed to being a leading Smart Robot platform with global influence in the era of human-robot collaboration.
Our portfolio of high-quality, secure products and services covers RPA Solution, including Laiye UiBot (an RPA product), Laiye Wulai (an enterprise chatbot platform), and Xiaolai (a companion robot). Join us on LinkedIn, follow us on Facebook, or visit laiye.com/en.
