Smart automation

Smart automation is automation that combines rule-based tools, such as workflow engines and robotic process automation, with AI that can read documents, understand text and make routine decisions. The term is often used interchangeably with intelligent automation.

Rule-based automation works well when inputs are structured and every case follows the same path. Smart automation extends it to work that needs some interpretation: an AI model extracts the fields from an invoice, classifies an incoming email or suggests the next step, and the workflow carries out the result.

In production, the AI steps usually come with confidence thresholds, human review of uncertain cases, logging and monitoring, so that a wrong prediction is caught before it changes a record in another system.