Ingram Micro has agreed to distribute UiPath's RPA (robotic process automation) software worldwide, the two technology companies confirmed.
Details about the relationship are set to be released on May 4 in North America, but surfaced in Australia about 12 hours ahead of the North America announcement. The development marks an important milestone for the RPA revolution. Indeed, RPA software allows businesses to write code and bots that rapidly automate manual tasks across multiple departments — from IT service desks to HR, finance, customer support and more.
The global relationship arrives roughly one week after UiPath's highly successful IPO, which valued the company at more than $35 billion after the first day of trading ($PATH).
Demand for RPA software is accelerating; global RPA software revenue is projected to reach $1.89 billion in 2021, up 19.5% from 2020, according to Gartner.
UiPath and Robotic Process Automation: Ready for Small Business Channel Partners?
Among the challenge areas: Most of the early RPA market buzz involves enterprise-style deployments. Generally speaking, nobody in the IT channel has stepped up to make RPA a truly global phenomena for VARs and MSPs that support small businesses.
Until now. The Ingram-UiPath relationship is expanding to North America and Latin America as well as Europe, Middle East, Africa, and the remainder of Asia Pacific, according to Scott Zahl, executive director of global partner enablement at Ingram Micro.
The seeds for this expanded partnership were planted in 2018, when Ingram Micro and UiPath began working together in India. The relationship expanded to China in 2019.
Amid that journey, Ingram built a "mature and dedicated UiPath team of experts" who can help channel partners throughout the sales cycle including opportunity identification, design thinking, advisory services, licensing and training, the distributor says.
Zahl sees multiple opportunities for channel partners. Potential examples include:
- VARs, systems integrations and IT consulting firms selling and deploying UiPath to assist end-customer automation.
- MSPs consuming UiPath within their own businesses to further automate their IT service desks and customer interactions.
- MSPs, ISVs and other types of UiPath partners developing their own software bot intellectual property.
- Partners providing RPA software bots as part of an ongoing managed service.
UiPath and Ingram Micro: More RPA Perspectives
In a prepared statement about the Ingram-UiPath business relationship, Sabine Howest, vice president, global partner engagement and IoT, Ingram Micro, said:
“Robotic process automation is an important component within a company’s digital transformation game plan, and a great sales wedge for channel partners to introduce DX solutions and services into their existing end user customer base. Using AI to automate repeatable, rules-driven processes is a practice companies of all sizes can benefit from and a growth opportunity we’re ready to drive with UiPath through our growing and global Advanced Solutions organization.”
Added Thomas Hansen, chief revenue officer, UiPath:
“Ingram Micro and UiPath are partner-first organizations equally committed to continually investing in our partners to drive greater service differentiation, exceptional growth, and improved profitability. Enterprise automation is a category channel partners cannot ignore, and an investment enterprise organizations are making because of the immediate and measurable return on investment and improvement to the associate experience and the customer experience. We are thrilled to expand our successful relationship with Ingram Micro worldwide and look forward to helping channel partners capitalize on the market potential for RPA.”
RPA Software Market Competition, Acquisitions
Amid the RPA market growth, multiple companies are acquiring RPA software providers and associated RPA consulting skills. Key RPA software companies include Automation Anywhere, Blue Prism, Microsoft Power Automate and ServiceNow.
Even IBM is jumping into the action, as part of IBM CEO Arvind Krishna's M&A effort to pivot the enterprise technology provider toward multi-cloud software that drives business automation.
Still, today's big move involves a different type of pivot. Namely Ingram Micro building a worldwide RPA pipeline that could fuel new types of automation across the SMB channel.
