India; Apr. 24, 2017 – Accenture (NYSE: ACN) launched a new platform for automated, analytics-driven software testing, after successfully completing pilots with 10 clients around the world. The Accenture Touchless Testing Platform brings together leading open source, commercial and Accenture proprietary tools and algorithms to automate a robust, touchless testing process for software – all guided by artificial intelligence and analytics.
The new platform allows testing teams to easily integrate tools from leading players such as Conformiq, Hewlett Packard Enterprise, Intel Saffron, Sauce Labs, Tableau, Tricentis and Worksoft, along with key Accenture innovations, to bring new enterprise software solutions to market faster and with higher quality. Continuous testing is increasingly important as companies look to software as a means of competitive advantage. Depending on the client engagement the platform can be deployed independently or as part of Accenture myWizard®.
“Software testing today still struggles with over-engineering efforts that can result in anywhere from 30 to 50 percent of wasted time and effort,” said Kishore Durg, managing director and global testing lead for Accenture. “With advances in analytics, artificial intelligence and data visualization, however, it’s now possible to not only find these areas of inefficiencies and eliminate them, but also to uncover business risks and opportunities that weren’t visible before. That is what the Accenture Touchless Testing Platform is designed to do.”
One insurance company that piloted the platform discovered they could accelerate their pace of delivery by improving their test suite. Using the platform’s cognitive engine, Accenture identified up to 22 percent test cases as duplicates or similar that could be eliminated. By applying such insights into defect detection and analysis, test execution and retesting, the company can significantly improve the speed and quality of the software development and accelerate overall cycle time.
For a major trading company, Accenture effectively used the platform’s data mining and analytics features for intelligent automation and testing of performance, availability, scalability and reliability attributes of their custom software platforms that have significant impact on production quality. Accenture used these techniques to help model complex workflows, detect production anomalies and early warnings and identify system usage and failure patterns to diagnose critical and hidden faults. Leveraging the platform, the company has been able to significantly improve the quality and performance of their risk management platform and trading system across distributed locations.
“The Accenture Touchless Testing Platform is the latest example of how Accenture is using automation and artificial intelligence to disrupt every aspect of the application lifecycle, and make IT an agent for speed, change and customer experience,” said Bhaskar Ghosh, group chief executive, Accenture Technology Services. “Artificial intelligence is helping us rethink old approaches to testing and helping testers operate smarter and more efficiently. Applying analytics to massive amounts of production and test data is key to spotting trends, predicting failures, managing risk and continuously responding to customer feedback, all of which is critical to competitiveness.”
The data visualization capabilities of the platform help testers make better use of volumes of data generated in a test cycle. This can help prioritize work based on quality heat maps, failure and usage patterns and test suite vitality. The platform also provides testers with early warnings on system anomalies, and real-time guided interventions. The overall test design and execution process is guided by an industry-specific reusable testing repository comprising more than 76,000 test scenarios, scripts and conditions across 33 industries and 280 end-to-end business processes.
For more information about Accenture Testing Services, visit Accenture.com/testing.
About Accenture
Accenture is a leading global professional services company, providing a broad range of services and solutions in strategy, consulting, digital, technology and operations. Combining unmatched experience and specialized skills across more than 40 industries and all business functions – underpinned by the world’s largest delivery network – Accenture works at the intersection of business and technology to help clients improve their performance and create sustainable value for their stakeholders. With more than 401,000 people serving clients in more than 120 countries, Accenture drives innovation to improve the way the world works and lives. Visit us at www.accenture.com.