Microsoft Digs Deeper into RPA With the Purchase of Softomotive

Global computing giant Microsoft has acquired robotic process automation (RPA) vendor Softomotive, vowing to democratize the RPA market by enabling everyone to create bots and automate repetitive tasks.

London-based Softmotive, whose competitors include the likes of Automation Anywhere and Uipath, is said to have more than 900 customers and is known for desktop automation software.

Demand for automation is growing like never before, with the lockdown measures imposed in response to the coronavirus outbreak bringing thousands of manufacturing units around the globe to a standstill. Last year, research firm Forrester predicted that one in 10 startups would employ more digital workers than human ones.

This is precisely the reason why Microsoft has made its foray into the automation market. For the Silicon Valley giant, Softomotive was an ideal pick because it created WinAutomation, a Windows application for automating tasks in Windows.

Softomotive, founded in Greece in 2005, has employed around 150 people. Microsoft has not confirmed whether it would take on board all the employees. What it did confirm was that it would fold Softomotive into its RPA arm Power Automate and make available WinAutomation to its existing customers at no cost.

“Microsoft is further democratizing RPA and enabling everyone to create bots to automate manual business processes,” wrote Microsoft Vice President Charles Lamanna in a blogpost. “Together with Power Automate, WinAutomation will provide customers additional options for RPA desktop authoring so anyone can build a bot and automate Windows-based tasks.”

Financial details of the deal have not been disclosed.