RPA ROI Calculator

There are many aspects to consider when performing an ROI (Return on Investment) calculation for an RPA implementation project. This page provides the facility to perform an ROI calculation but it is based on a number of assumptions which may or may not be true for every organisation. Ether Solutions would be pleased to assist in specific ROI calculations but we believe the details below provide a reasonable starting point however we would be delighted to hear of any suggestions for improvements.

To determine the Robotic Process Automation cost, the software, people and infrastructure elements are are considered. For the purposes of the calculator only the manpower effort saved is considered, the other RPA benefits arising from quality and processing speed are not included.

When using the form, use the TAB key or click the mouse outside of a field and the calculation / re-calculation will take place for the input sections. Click the “Calculate” button at the top or bottom to perform a complete calculation.

By hovering the mouse over the blue icons, a description of the field will be displayed.

To start click the “Calculate” button below to use the defaults. Look at the results then change any values for your scenario and click on the “Calculate” button to see the impact of the change.

Working Environment

This section is about defining the working environment where the business process activity is performed.

Days in year 🛈 This is the number of days in a year, ignore leap years

Business trading days in year 🛈 Number of business trading days each year when process operate

Weekend days in year 🛈 This is the number of weekend days in a year, normal 52 weeks, 2 days a week

Effective Working days for staff 🛈 Number of effective working days for each member of staff

Bank Holidays in year 🛈 This is the number of Bank Holidays that occur each year

Staff holidays in year 🛈 Number of days staff are allocated as holiday each year

Training days in year 🛈 Number of days staff are typically on training each year

Typical staff sick days in year 🛈 Number of days staff are typically sick each year

Notes: It is assumed that all staff work the same amount of days.

Existing Process

This section is about defining the current activity to operate the business process that is the candidate for automation.

Average Salary of staff 🛈 This is the average salary for staff performing the process

Cost per hour of staff 🛈 Effective cost per hour of staff member

Staff hours per working day 🛈 This is the number of hours that staff work each day

Daily cost of process 🛈 Daily cost of staff performing the process

Hours each person on process 🛈 This is the number of hours per day each staff member performs the process

Number of staff 🛈 Number of staff performing the process

Employment costs, overhead factor 🛈 Factor for Employers Taxes, Pension Contribution, Office Space, Management, etc.

Notes: It is assumed that only one process is being automated.

RPA Project

This section is about the RPA project activity.

UiPath Robot Licence Subscription 🛈 Cost of licence subscriptions

Robot development and testing cost 🛈 Cost to develop and test Robots

Infrastructure Costs for Robots 🛈 This is the infrastructure cost per year (hardware, Operating system, etc.)

Total Project Cost - Year 1 🛈 Cost of RPA project- Year 1

Implementation cost for RPA environment 🛈 This is the cost to implement the RPA environment

Number of Robots 🛈 Number of robots that will deployed

Complexity of Robots 🛈 Complexity- 1=Simple, 3=Typical, 5=Complex

Cost of business users 🛈 Cost of business users working development and testing

Support costs 🛈 Cost of on-going RPA support, patching, software upgrades, bug fixes

Notes: It is assumed that this is the first RPA project and only a small number of robots will be used.

RPA Robot Capacity and Unit Costs

This section is about the RPA capacity that will be delivered by the implementation.

Robot Capacity in hours 🛈 Hours per year of Robot capacity (24 x 7 x 365)

Robot cost per hour 🛈 This is cost of Robot per hour at Capacity

Robot utilisation percentage 🛈 Percentage based on required hours of process work compared with capacity

Equivalent Staff hours for RPA Cost 🛈 Number of hours of staff time equivalent to cost of RPA

Equivalent Staff hours per day 🛈 Number of hours of staff time per day equivalent to RPA cost

Notes: It is assumed that the robots could perform tasks whether or not staff are working.

As a comparison to investing in RPA, the calculation also shows how much extra effort could be delivered for the same cost.

Return On Investment

This section is about the RPA capacity that will be delivered by the implementation.

Savings 🛈 Savings per year

Robot subscription 🛈 Robot subscription licences

Robot build and support costs 🛈 Robot support costs: software upgrades, patching, bug fix, knowledge maintenance

Nett 🛈 Nett benefit from RPA

ROI Percentage 🛈 ROI as a percentage per annum

Ether Solutions has made a number of assumptions in the above calculation, these include:

Staff activity on the process can be fully replace by software robots, although in reality there are likely to be some exceptions to manually process
Staff time released by the automation can be effectively used. No benefit created from such time has been included in the calculations
The UiPath Licence Subscription has a default of a typical configuration for up to 3 robots with a typical mix of “Attended” and “Un-Attended” usage. The exact costs will depend on the actual number of robots and their usage, this calculation is for guidance only
The UiPath Automation Cloud is being used as the basis of the activity as this provides the minimum setup time and enables effort to focus on robot builds.

If you have any comments on the calculations, questions, or if you discover any errors, please contact us in order that we can provide assistance.