Using Automation Studio with Epicor CPQ

Epicor Automation Studio, powered by Workato®, can help connect Epicor CPQ with various other applications.

Automation Studio is a separate, optional module. It is not part of the baseline Epicor CPQ system. You cannot access any of the integration features described below in Epicor CPQ without first purchasing Automation Studio.

In this article, we explore:

• Understanding the Basics of Automation Studio
• Getting Started with Automation Studio inside Epicor CPQ
• Components of Automation Studio
• Data Flow in Automation Studio
  • An Example Recipe
• Accessing Automation Studio Education
  • Documentation
  • Training

Understanding the Basics of Automation Studio

Every Automation Studio workflow is based on simple components that combine to automate a workflow.

• A Recipe is the foundation for any workflow.
  It contains all the components needed to perform the automation. The components of a recipe are:

• Triggers determine when a recipe starts.
  Different kinds of triggers can cause your recipe to start based on a schedule, when a message is recieved through a webhook / API call from another application, or even from the result of another recipe.
• Connections read and write information to your applications.
  When a recipe is triggered and begins, the first step is establishing a connection between Automation Studio and other applications. Each connection is associated with one instance of the application and can be re-used across multiple recipes. For example, a connection can be made to Epicor CPQ, an email system, a CRM system like salesforce.com, or your own application written in a language like Python.
• Steps inside a recipe perform the work.
  Different kinds of steps may perform an action (such as search for a delivery record), decide if an action should be performed using conditional logic (such as IF data matches, THEN update the delivery date on that record), or repeat other steps (such as perform the delivery update on all records in a list).

Getting Started with Automation Studio inside Epicor CPQ

By default, your Epicor CPQ instance can display Automation Studio within the administrative UI, under Admin > Settings > Automation Studio.

Selecting this menu option displays Automation Studio within Epicor CPQ.

When clicking this tab, you may see a warning instead of the screen shown above. Once that registration is completed, the warning will disappear. The warning provides more information on registering for Automation Studio, or you can contact our support team.

1. While the CPQ administrative interface is still visible along the left edge of the window, you are now in the separate Automation Studio environment.
2. Use the Assets Nav Tree to view your active and recently stopped recipes.
3. Select the Connections icon to view the connections your integration system already knows, and to create new ones.
4. Select the Trash icon to see the recipes that are no longer in use.
5. Related recipes can be grouped together into a project. The Projects pane on the right lists all projects you have access to. Click any project tile to see the recipes it contains, or create a new one.
6. Use the top toolbar to view other areas in Automation Studio.

• Home
  Shows a dashboard with your current activity. Use this view to see how many recipes and tasks were used, whether the recipes were successful, and other information.
• Recipes
  Create, update, and delete your recipes on this page.
• API Management
  If you have access to the API management tools, this page shows a dashboard that monitors API connection activity. Use this dashboard to review successful requests, errors, response times, and other connection information.
• Community
  Shows the external cloud-based tools you can integrate with Kinetic. The Community page displays a series of Epicor recommended apps. Select an app to explore its recipes.

Components of Automation Studio

You can create low-code or no-code workflows using recipes. Every automation workflow is a recipe. Recipes are the building blocks of any automation workflow, and they can span multiple applications.A recipe starts with a trigger, and consists of connections to data sources and actions that it performs through those connections after it is triggered.

Actions can be of various types:

• an event performed in an application.
• an IF condition that is satisfied, or either branch of an IF/ELSE condition that is met.
• a repeat action that is performed for some set of items.
• a call to another recipe.
• a stop to the job, including handling any errors from the job.

Recipes that combine multiple actions together are classified based on the kind of trigger that starts them:

• Time-based: schedule the recipe to start on a repeating basis (every 15 minutes, 24 hours, week, etc).
• Application: start the recipe based on connector logic.
• Webhook (API): start the recipe from a callback or “push” from another system, such as a BPM, CRM, etc.
• Function: start the recipe from another recipe.

Data Flow in Automation Studio

When your recipe performs an action step, the result is a datapill. A datapill could be a simple value (like the current price of Gold), or complex (like a collection of order lines). In every recipe step, you have access to datapills from all the previous steps. You can use them in the input fields for the current step. Field mapping controls what data flows between the apps in your recipe. You can look at the following example to understand how Automation Studio can run your business efficiently.

An Example Recipe

One recipe could help your company streamline purchase order approvals. Let’s say a buyer creates a purchase order (PO) within your ERP platform. Thanks to a trigger watching for any new unapproved PO in the ERP system, our recipe will start. The recipe will connect to the ERP and gather the information from that PO into a datapill. Then, an email step will place specific information from that PO, along with other info determined through business logic, into an email template. The resulting email message will be sent to the appropriate purchasing manager. It could look like this:

Note how three links in the email make it easy for the purchasing manager to view, approve, or reject the PO. Depending on the link the purchasing manager selects, Automation Studio runs one of three separate tasks: the view PO, approve PO, or reject PO task. The resulting action either sends the purchasing manager more information to view, or sends data back to the ERP system to approve or reject the PO.