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UiPath
| Power Score: 53.47 | Momentum Score: 45.88 (2) | HQ: New York, NY | CEO: Daniel Dines |
Economics
Valuation: $35.48 billion (+1% vs. last round, 2020)
Amt. Raised: $1.95 billion
Politics
Lobbying Spend: No
Industry Orgs: No
People
Headcount:
3,423 (+25% YoY)
Engineering Headcount: 775 (+34% YoY)
Big Tech Experience: 10%
Open Roles: 379
Innovation
R&D Spending: n/a
Patents Applied For: 37
Patents Owned: 8
Acquisitions: Cloud Elements (March 2021)
Leadership
Exec Team Exits : No
Diversity Data?: No
ESG/CSR Data? : No
On Power
UiPath enjoys its status as the investor darling of the RPA industry: Its $35-billion+ market cap is nearly triple that of the NICE, the standalone RPA competitor with the next-highest market cap of $13.3 billion. UiPath
IPO'd in April 2021
and experienced a 23% price pop on opening day. Since then, however, the price has
slumped its way below
the starting point.
UiPath hasn't necessarily flexed its power outside the economic realm — it doesn't have a PAC, it hasn't spent on lobbying this year and it has no internal head of policy. This is par for the course in the RPA sector, though, probably because it doesn't face the prospect of any major political upheaval, at least for now. The company's blog hints at concern about the kind of bad press that most companies with an automation or robotics focus face now and again: that their technology will make workers redundant. It's seemingly no accident, then, that UiPath owns two of the top three results on Google for the term "RPA kills jobs," which link to company blogs about why that's not the case.
On Disruption
UiPath may lead the pack in terms of power, but its star doesn't shine as bright when it comes to disruption. This is particularly true if you compare it to Automation Anywhere. For instance, both UiPath and Automation Anywhere had around 2,800 employees one year ago, but Automation Anywhere grew headcount nearly 53% while UiPath grew just under 25%. At the same time, Automation Anywhere saw its market cap swell nearly fourfold, while UiPath's market cap has stagnated post-IPO.
Tea Leaves
UiPath might be the current leader in the standalone RPA field, but that also just means it has more to lose if RPA proves to be a "transient technology," as critics have labeled it. To avoid this fate, UiPath must continue to develop and integrate novel AI applications into its core RPA platform. So far, it has introduced products such as its "document understanding" feature and RPA analytics tool . UiPath CEO Daniel Dines told Protocol's Joe Williams that a key to success will be changing businesses' mentality to one that is automation-first as they design new processes.
They Said It
" The best way to combat hype is by progress ... Putting up substantive progress and substantive financial numbers … that is what is going to continue to drive a substantive valuation." — CFO Ashim Gupta in an April 2021 interview with Protocol