>>From the Bellagio hotel in Las Vegas, it's the cube covering UI path forward for brought to you by UI path. >>Welcome back to Las Vegas. Lisa Martin, with Dave Vellante at UI path forward for, we have had it all today. Lots of great guests. We've had weather, we've had rain. We are outside and lots of great conversations going on. Next up, we're going to be talking about automation at healthcare giant. Merck. Joining us from merch is Dan Boyd automation leader, and from CGI partner of UI paths, bill angles, senior automation architect, guys, welcome to the program. >>Thanks for having us. >>So Dan, we'll go ahead and start with you. Let's talk about Merck and the implement and the adoption of automation, such a history company. >>Yeah. Thank you. Um, our journey started about two years ago and started with the small team and has evolved ever since we started just the handful of folks we've evolved, uh, from the size of our team, matured, operationally and expanded our capabilities along that journey to where we are today. And it continues to evolve as the technology changes. And it's been exciting to see the adoption at Merck over, you know, across the enterprise. Um, it's been an educational process, but it's been exciting just to see that understanding of the power that automation can deliver to them. And they see the value in making it real to them has been key. Um, then once it's real and they get excited and the word spreads and they appreciate the value right before their eyes and bill, are you, >>Uh, industry specialized or more automation specialist? >>Yeah. Yeah. So I'm more, uh, automation specialized, but uh, you know, CGI, we partner with our industry experts to identify use cases for automation and I help kind of, you know, solution the best approach to automation. Uh, and you know, so I actually started, you know, with, with Merck a little bit earlier before it was really formalized and, uh, just CGI is a large partner of merch and embedded within various areas of business. And, you know, I, I ended up educating, uh, CGI on automation and here's what to look for, you know, in a, in a, in a great use case for automation and, you know, really, we started to drum up some internal excitement and then came up with some actual real use cases within Merck, proved it out early. And then we began to partner with, uh, Dan and his team. >>Can you share a little bit about some of those use cases? Yes. >>So, you know, the ones that, uh, we've worked on are really specific within, uh, various areas, uh, within the division. So Dan, you want to talk about some of the >>You're working on yeah, I'll share one use case within a specific market of merch, and it's a commercial area where they were embarking on a revision in their customer engaged engagement approach in this market and where the, they had a problem. They, they needed to get the invoices out of SAP for customers. So that was on the one side of the process on the other was a customer portal where the customers needed access near real time to those invoices. So when they came to us, they had the invoices kind of set up to be emailed out of SAP. So they had that process set up. The problem is how do they get them over here into this customer portal? Say the backup plan was to have a temporary workers come on and do that manually handle the open emails with the invoices attachments and get them loaded. >>So we came in, uh, they called us in, in the 11th hour and we were able to, fortunately that the process was straightforward, uh, whereas invoices were coming through, uh, an email attachment and that was set up. So basically we automated the reading of the emails, the processing of the PDF attachments and saved them into a shared drive where there was another process to load them into SAP. So the volume was really large on a daily basis. Initially it was estimated at approximately 2,500 emails per day with these invoices. Um, so that would estimate it would take about 125 hours of people time to do that manually. Um, so that's what we automated. And in the end it was the averages it's over 3000 a day. So, um, the solution really came in and, and we were able to deliver that. And it's been a really, they were, they were static with what they could do, and then they saw the art of the possible with, with this automation. So it's a good success story. And, um, it's exciting to see, and they were thrilled >>And it's not an uncommon story, right. Where you're automating mundane tasks that was pushing a lot of paper, a lot of copy and pasting. Um, do you see how far away, and maybe we're there already? You think about mark it's it's uh, in a, in a unique industry, we've got, got highly skilled scientists too in serious R and D high risk trials. You got partners, you do some organic, some inorganic, you've got the manufacturing components. So a lot of different parts to the business. And when you think about saving time, as you think about some of the, the scientists that are working on various pipeline products, highly paid, if you can save more of their time, wow. That even drops more to the bottom line. Are we at that point yet? We heard the stats this morning. It was 2% or some single digit percentage of our processes are automated. How far away are we from attacking those types of automations? Are we there today? >>Uh, we do automations for all the, all the functions across Merck. Um, in some places adoption is farther along than others in their journey, but yeah, um, from the shop floor and the manufacturing sites, we found opportunities to, to introduce automation there. And even in the, in the labs in various capacities, see the use cases continue to grow and the adoption continue. We see that growing as well. >>Do you find that the, the highly skilled, uh, automations targeted at highly skilled folks are, are harder to sort of get your hands around, but they give you bigger ROI? Or is it not the case? Is it all sort of earn and burn? >>Yeah, from my perspective, I think it's, you know, use case by use case. Like if it's a, a complex use case, it requires, you know, more advanced capabilities, uh, you know, machine learning models, you know, leveraging, uh, you know, AI center within UI path, uh, you know, those they can, you know, provide, you know, fairly sizeable ROI, but I think is for those highly skilled workers, I'll give one example is, you know, out in, out in the labs, we, we helped, you know, automate some things that, you know, just made their life easier, right. Uh, you know, tests running overnight, if something failed, uh, with, with a test that was happening, then, you know, they, they wouldn't know about it and they lose critical data for, for these early tests that they're doing in, in the, in the preclinical cycle. So we actually put in a UI path robots to, to monitor and send alerts and provide recovery to make their lives a lot easier. Uh, so they don't have to worry about things, you know, failing in the middle of the night, you have a UI path robot, you know, supporting them in that map, that aspect, >>What's an automation, architecture look like we, where do we start architecting automation? >>Well, I think the journey, uh, so where do you start with an automation? Right. It's really understanding the use case. It comes down to what is the, the end to end process, and then where, where can we automate, uh, within that process and what is the right set of automation capabilities? So, you know, RPA is great for, you know, um, where we get, where we need to interact with user interfaces. But if we can, uh, you know, interact with API APIs, we would do that. You know, preferably over a UI is, is to keep, keep it more of a seamless integration. But I think it's about understanding the process, laying out the right solution, uh, if there's an opportunity to improve the process prior to automating it, you know, if there's, if there is that ability, then we'll look to do that. And we've done that. We may change that process, uh, up a little bit, just to make automation more efficient, more effective. Uh, and so, and then it just, we built it and we deploy it and they start to realize the value >>Hard. Is it dental prove the, on the versus just automating what's, what's known. In other words, you've got dependencies and there are complexities there w what's your experience in terms of how you approached it >>From my experience and what we found to be best practice and bill touched on it. But every use case is of course different than the, the corresponding process. Very, very varied, but really what's key, I think, is to right upfront, understand the end to end process. And a lot of cases, my team it's new to us, right. But the process owners, they live it every day. So understanding, partnering with them to really understand the end to end solution in the form of like a process map. So you can kind of echo back your understanding of their process and get that nod of the head from them and say, yes, you understand that this is an accurate representation. Then we can with the spirit of trying to get it right the first time. And, but it really, I think is incumbent upon us to really get that in-depth understanding upfront. And a lot of cases, if there's time sensitivity in the end, it's just more efficient and saves a lot of rework. So, >>So working backwards, sorry, at least working backwards from the known existing process and then implementing an automation is probably the best starting point, as opposed to trying to work backwards from some kind of the outcome that you envision. But, but I would think there's attractiveness in the, in the ladder. Right. So that you're not just repeating a process that may be outdated. >>Yeah. So your, uh, it comes down to a couple of things. So when you're initially looking at a process, you know, should we automate this or not? And how complex is it? You need to understand what is the potential benefit. So, you know, how much, uh, you know, how much time am I able to, uh, you know, have those workers reinvest into other areas of work, right. Or what other, what are some other benefits? Uh, you know, there, there may be some, uh, you know, compliance fines that were experienced through automation, we're able to, you know, to make sure we're meeting SLS and so on. Uh, so you is a lot to, you know, defining the benefits, the automation, putting a value to that. And then the process of going through the actual process, understand the complexity, right? And then you can come up with, you know, here's, here's what it's gonna take to build this thing. Here's the potential value. And then we have ways where we track, you know, what's, how has that ROI trending once it's in production? Uh, so we'll be, that gives us more insight. >>Dan, I've got a question for you. One of the conversations that Dave and I had earlier on the program was about automation as a boardroom topic. I'd love to get your perspectives. Merck is a history organization, been around for a long time. Cultural change is incredibly challenging, but I'd love to get your perspective on where is automation at Merck's board. Is that something that is really key to transformation? >>I'd say automation falls under our strategic initiative, just around digital digital transformation, right? So it's a sub pillar of that. So that is a strategic imperative and very important. And just being a more efficient and, and leveraging technology effectively, um, just to make merch more efficient and, and, and optimized and RPA and automation plays a part in that. I mean, >>That's what I suspected Lisa this morning when we have in that conversation, it seems to me that you wouldn't necessarily create an automation stove pipe at the board meeting. You might want to report on how these automations have affected, whether it's the income statement or the health of the company, et cetera. But it seems to me to be a fundamental part of the digital transformation, um, which involves a lot of different things, data and cloud and strategy and it et cetera. So is that pretty >>Common bill? Yeah, I, yes, it is. I mean, when, when an organization is looking to automate there's, you know, various angles are coming out, they're coming from the top-down approach where, you know, management saying, Hey, we need to, we need to automate what's, let's look across all the divisions and, and figure out where, where we should go. But then it's also, you know, bottom up where, you know, folks out in, out within the various lines of business know, they, they know the problems. They know, they know the business processes. So there's a couple of different angles where, you know, you you're able to discover new opportunities to automate. Uh, but those also those smaller ones opened the door to understanding, you know, much larger processes where we can look, you know, automate more of the upstream or downstream in that process. Are there variations of the process? So >>Was, was merch more bottom-up or top-down or middle out? I wouldn't say it's >>Started bottoms up. That's really out there. It came from the top-down. So as bill touched on, I think it's really key that we do have, uh, from, from this coming from the top, from our leadership is endorsing it and advocating it, but also we're on the, on the ground floor and educating. So the people with the hands-on doing the process, they understand it and the word is spreading. They see we've, we've made it real for them. Now it's real for them, and they can appreciate the value. And they're happy to be able to do more, to be freed up from the tedious tasks and do more interesting work. >>So we did start in the department, there was a champion with a budget who said, Hey, I'm going to try this and then look what I got. Yeah, >>Yeah. You definitely need the champion. So part of that is creating champions out in the different business lines to truly own the pipeline and understand the opportunities are out there and say, yeah, this is a good opportunity. This, this one let's look at it later. So you definitely have to have those folks out there that, that understand the technology, but also understand the business. >>How has that changed in the last 18 months with healthcare care undergoing such? I mean, my goodness, the things that have happened in a healthcare organization, how has that accelerated the need for things like automation, Christian, for both of you and for mark as well? Yeah. >>Yeah. So mark initiated, uh, like most companies that digital transformation, three, three plus years ago, and this just became an extension of that. And, and it's, it's a, it's a must, right? Just to stay up with the, the digital transformation and everything that's happening in this world. And, and obviously, uh, COVID accelerated, helped accelerate it in certain areas and made it real for a lot of people and appreciate the value and the need for it. >>Yeah. W within CGI, just across all of our clients, it's automation is really towards the top of the list of strategic priorities. So it's, so we've seen this massive just acceleration of, of needing to automate more and more and more, you know, which is, which is great. >>What's it like inside a merch these days, you guys must be really excited with all that. I mean, I know it's early days and nothing has been fully blessed yet, but I mean, you know, some of the big has got a lot of headlines and obviously, you know, we've been taking jabs, et cetera, but, but now here's Merck in the headlines. It's, it's gotta be an exciting time for you guys. >>Yeah. It's, it's great to be part of a company whose mission is to save and improve lives and right. It's um, with today, it's, it's really becoming real and more relevant, uh, of that mission and vision. So it's exciting. >>There were any gotchas when you go into this, I'm sure there are into this automation journey. What kinds of things would you advise people, Hey, make sure that you deal with these, whether it's an audit scope, consideration or things that you definitely don't want to do, or do you want to do? >>Yeah. It just comes down to the, you know, choosing the right use case to start with. Right. Making sure that you, if you're just starting out in your automation journey, you know, start with those use cases that you can quickly prove value for and then tackle the more complex ones. That's good >>For folks to know where to start, especially when there's still such a tumultuous environment that we're living in. Dan and bill. Thank you for joining Dave and Manet, talking about automation, the innovation that you're doing at Merck partnering with CGI really appreciate >>Your time. Thanks for having us >>For Dave Volante. I'm Lisa Martin, coming to you from windy, chilly Las Vegas. We are at UI path forward for stick around Dave and I will be right back with our next guest.