This week we had the pleasure of interviewing Miguel Ángel González, Vice President of Appian Iberia & Latam.
How did Appian start in Spain and what is your role in the company?
Appian is a company that has 20 years of history in the American market and in Spain, we have had a local office for six years. I joined together with Ramón Riquelme for the Iberia region in September 2016 due to the potential I saw in the company. At that time, we were two people, and today the company in Spain has more than 100 employees. In this period of time, I went from ensuring the arrival and proper establishment of the company in Spain in 2016 to leading its transformation into a reference company in the Spanish and Portuguese market for business process management (BPM), case management, and low-code, and increasingly with global accounts in Latin America. We work mainly with large companies (IBEX, listed on the continuous market...) although we also do things for smaller companies since it is a technology that is very adaptable to any type of business.
In Iberia, we have two offices (Madrid and Seville), we are the only company in the sector that has local support in Spanish, which offers a great difference with respect to the rest of the competitors, and we are very happy to have a presence here. The company is also in the main cities of Europe and is listed on Nasdaq. In fact, we went public in 2017, and it was the most successful debut in that year for a technology company. We are also the first low-code company to go public. This year, 2023, we face great challenges with enthusiasm, despite the difficulties presented by the global economy, the Spanish team will lead the bet for other regions such as Portugal or Latin America.
What is Appian, and what are its core pieces?
Appian is a low-code platform that combines the fundamental capabilities needed to do work faster (Process Mining + Workflow + Automation) on a unified platform. Appian discovers, designs, and automates processes, achieving very positive results that represent a quantifiable business benefit for its clients. It is also an open enterprise-level platform and is trusted by industry leaders. Appian accelerates clients' businesses by discovering, designing, and automating their processes. They do this by combining process mining, workflows, and automation into a unified low-code platform that makes any company's work more efficient and enables its processes to adapt to market changes much faster. One of the core pieces for Appian is "workflow," which is deeply rooted in the company from the beginning. Appian understands workflow as a bridge between process mining and automation, placing it at the center of the service to its clients, giving them a competitive advantage over their competitors. Identifying the workflow and ordering digital and human tasks in a company makes it more efficient, offers higher quality, and makes its processes scalable.
Additionally, especially in recent years, Appian has focused on automation to include in a company's workflow the necessary AI-based software and assistants to delegate certain repetitive tasks. These elements are robotic process automation (RPA), intelligent document processing (IDP), and artificial intelligence (AI), which, correctly linked to the rest of business or business activities, are much more efficient. In this combination, process mining plays a fundamental role in unearthing business processes that must be optimized through automation. In the past, process mining was considered an isolated tool, but Appian takes the information obtained from process mining and acts on it faster than ever by combining it with automation and workflows.
What is the differential element that Appian is most proud of?
The process mining is the most innovative part of Appian's offering and what really sets us apart, as it is offered integrated into their platform alongside workflow and automation. This provides significant added value by reducing the number of steps taken from obtaining information to taking action. It can be applied to discovery processes, as well as to optimize existing ones. On the other hand, Appian's guarantee to its customers is noteworthy, based on the philosophy that one must go from idea to application as quickly as possible. Business requests for creating new and transformative software applications are exponentially increasing, but 50% of those requests fail. Therefore, the Appian Guarantee offers an 8-week delivery deadline for its first application for a fixed fee. The simplicity and power of the Appian Low-Code Platform ensures that anyone with technical knowledge can train as an Appian developer in 2 weeks.
What role does innovation play within Appian?
Innovation plays a central role in Appian as it allows us to develop the solutions our clients need. There is a consensus among IT professionals that technologies such as low-code, artificial intelligence (AI), and machine learning will be key to addressing the business challenges facing IT departments, while helping organizations adapt to change and streamline work. Appian's Low-Code Platform allows for digital innovation to be unleashed and for growth to be driven. In this sense, the industry agrees that a broad set of automation technologies is needed to drive workflows across the enterprise, and Appian's complete automation is a great differentiator. Appian's automation capability is not limited to one technology, but to a unified and native set of technologies that allow customers to use the right tools for the job.
How does Appian help its customers?
Appian solves the different needs of each client and adapts to the requirements of each sector. The platform easily adapts because it connects people, data, and systems in a seamless workflow. This helps customers get the most out of their existing resources. Appian offers a wide range of native capabilities, all included in the platform, so customers can choose the right combination of technologies for their specific use case. It offers a selection of "pre-packaged" combinations with platform capabilities that address specific use cases. And if a customer's needs change, they can be easily added, removed, or configured as desired. Appian empowers customers to select the most appropriate solution for their specific use case.
How does Appian apply its solutions in regulated sectors?
As an open platform, it is easier for Appian to respect the business decisions of the different sectors it works with, complying with the strictest standards of reliability, performance, and security required by leading companies and government agencies worldwide. Appian does well in regulated markets because it has a strong sense of data governance and provides the security boundaries that company CIOs need to have full visibility and control over their systems. With economies in recession, it is common for process controls to come under greater scrutiny and for governments to apply more regulatory enforcement. Companies face many challenges related to financial transparency, system visibility in supply chains, and monitoring of environmental policies. To meet these requirements, highly regulated sectors have to ensure end-to-end process control. Open platforms like Appian provide versatile solutions that are already being applied in such diverse sectors as finance, insurance, healthcare, manufacturing, telecommunications, logistics, and supply chain management, among others.
Why did Appian choose to become partners with AmChamSpain?
Appian was born and is an American company, but with a clear global aspiration. We consider being partners with the American Chamber of Commerce in Spain to be key because it provides us with the necessary tools to grow our business in the country. We see AmChamSpain as a meeting point between the Spanish and American business landscape, which aligns perfectly with our origin and our commitment to the Spanish and Spanish-speaking market. We believe that with its programs, events, publications, etc., it generates an exchange of ideas, innovative projects, and access to resources to promote Appian in the right way.
