Australian BPO may set up branch in Davao

MANILA, Philippines - Australia-based business process outsourcing (BPO) operator Admerex is eyeing Davao City as the possible location of its second contact center in the Philippines, an umbrella group for outsourcing services said Thursday.

Eriberto P. Barriga, Jr., vice-president for external affairs of ICT Davao, Inc., said in a statement the Admerex group had inspected the area as it plans to expand within the year.

Ces A. Sembrano of Admerex Philippines confirmed that the company was considering Davao for its second site. It has one contact center in Makati City with 500 agents. The expansion will require 500 more agents.

There are 18 call centers in Davao City operated by companies like Cyber City, Call Box, Sutherland and Western Wats.

"Their interest [in Davao] now is higher [than] two years ago," Mr. Barriga said. He said the increasing willingness of property owners to adjust to requirements of the information and communications technology sector has attracted investor interest.

At present, 12 sites are available for locators, and most property owners are willing to retrofit buildings to accommodate investors’ needs.

The Business Processing Association of the Philippines earlier said the country must develop three-quarters of talent living outside the National Capital Region. The BPO sector, IT and engineering sectors can grow by as much as 40% annually through 2010 if this talent is tapped, the group said.
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Infosys opens BPO campus at Mahindra SEZ

Infosys today announced the inauguration of its BPO at Mahindra World City's SEZ with an investment of Rs 171 crore in the first phase.

Rajathan Chief Minister Vasundhara Raje, who inaugurated the facility, said it was not the issue of land or money, but she had to changed the mindset of people specially bureaucratic set up.

"Though we are lagging behind in the race of SEZ set up, but it is an amazing efforts that the goal was accomplished in less than 2 years of its inception," she said.

Infosys CEO and Managing Director Kris Gopalakrishnan said," Jaipur is becoming an exciting destination for the IT-ITeS industry. Raje has proactively put in place progressive policies and has invested in infrastructure to ensure rapid growth."

The new campus at the SEZ would be spread over 42 acres of land with a total investment of Rs 531 crore to be made in phases, he said.

Infosys HR Director T V Mohandas Pai said their campus at Sitapura near Jaipur has been operational since August 2006 and seen an investment of Rs 22.77 crore with a capacity of 890 employees. The Sitapura BPO made a revenue of USD 15 million, Pai said.
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Are BPO jobs no longer attractive? Working for a BPO today is a fast way to rake in the moolah!

But what’s it like to be a BPO employee? The popular perception now is that ‘BPO’ is no more the acronym for Brighter Prospects & Opportunities. But is this true?

Well, the truth is that the BPO industry has done a whole lot of good for the country in terms of providing mass employment opportunities. In the early 1990s, it was unheard of for a graduate to get a job without having any additional qualifications. Today, an English-speaking graduate from any town or city in the country can easily find employment.

So, while the West continues to depend on us because of the relatively cheaper costs and intellectual capital here, why are people still hesitant to take up a BPO job? A former BPO employee, Arvind quit his job and opted for higher education. “It’s difficult to climb the corporate ladder beyond a certain point without a master’s degree.

A stint with a BPO became absolutely necessary to kill spare time while preparing for the numerous entrance exams to various colleges. I don’t want to be a BPO employee all my life,” he says.

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BPOs get `code of conduct` for employees` security, finally

Taking the first concrete step towards curtailing the rising incidents of crime against business process outsourcing (BPO) staffers, a group of 32 Pune-based BPOs and National Association of Software and Service Companies (NASSCOM) have framed a "code of conduct" to ensure their physical security.

The code of conduct, which is soon expected to be replicated across the country, deals with aspects such as security during travel, selection of transport vendors, internal communication and security within company premises.

Pune city has a BPO community of more than 95,000 and some 3,000 cars and jeeps are used as pick-up and drop vehicles for them by the 32 units.

Prominent players like Wipro, Zensar, WNS, KPIT Cummins, Mphasis and Ocean Connect have all agreed to implement the code of conduct framed by the best practises committee.

BPO vendors see larger US deals by year-end

Clients expected to complete internal evaluation process by then

Mixed fortune

It is a temporary slump in offshoring due to the US credit crunch and the BPOs expect the same factors to fuel increased demand for outsourcing by year-end.

The uncertain environment has indeed forced client companies in the US to ‘reprioritise’ and ‘review’ their roadmap for the future
Adith Charlie

Mumbai, May 4 Is recession good or bad for the business process outsourcing sector? Probably both! Recession in US seems to be a mixed bag for Indian BPO vendors.

They do agree there has been a temporary slump in offshoring due to the US credit crunch, but expect the same recession-related factors to fuel increased demand for outsourcing by the end of the calendar year.

Both IT and BPO companies are witnessing a spate of project delays and cancellations, especially in the financial services space, due to recession in the world’s largest economy. It must be noted that clients can save up to $5 million in costs annually if they enter into a major outsourcing contract. So why are the US companies going slow on their BPO engagements even when they want to cut costs in a recession?

Says Mr Raju Venkatraman, Joint Managing Director and Chief Operating Officer of Mumbai-based Firstsource Solutions, “When a company is hit by a crisis that is at least 100 times bigger than the cost benefits that outsourcing will bring, would it think about saving $5 million a year or find solutions for the bigger problem?” Outsourcing is important, but not a priority in a crisis-like situation, he adds. -
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BPO opportunity seen in UK due to UK 'knowledge worker' shortage

MANILA, Philippines--The current shortage of "knowledge workers" in the United Kingdom is good news for the country's outsourcing push in Europe.

A recent report from The Work Foundation, a London-based research and consultancy firm, said that the UK will need to attract more highly skilled workers from overseas for its high technology and "'knowledge intensive" industries.

The report's author noted that numbers are "relatively low," with only 167,000 high skilled workers in the country.

Reached for comment, Stephanie Weber, European IT Services Center (EITSC) business development manager, said UK companies have been suffering from the skills shortage for some time now.

According to the report, Filipinos are the third largest group of highly-skilled migrant workers, with a population of around 10,000. Indian nationals are by far the largest group with more than 45,000 followed by about 25,000 workers from the United States.

Next to the Philippines is South Africa (8,000) and Australia (6,500).

Under the previous work permit regime in the UK, 24 percent of highly skilled migrants were ICT professionals, 13 per cent were service managers and almost 10 percent in the healthcare sector.

The IT Examiner's quick guide to outsourcing

In recent years India has become an outsourcing Hub for the West, mainly because of lower costs and a good talent base available in the country.

The outsourcing services include customer care, BPO, medical transcription, telemarketing, market research , manufacturing, designing data management services, engineering services, financial services, creative services, web analytics services, healthcare services, ghost writing, digital image editing services, and software services.

So what exactly is outsourcing and why do companies do this, with India hogging the limelight? There are questions whether or not the economic slowdown will affect the outsourcing trend and even whether it will expand to other areas.

Outsourcing can be defined as a process in which a company delegates some of its in-house operations/processes to a third party. Thus, outsourcing is a contractual transaction through which one company buys services from another while keeping ownership and ultimate responsibility for the underlying processes. The clients inform their provider what they want and how they want the work performed. So the client can authorize the provider to operate as well as redesign basic processes in order to ensure even greater cost and efficiency benefits. Importance in outsourcing should be understood where the third party or partner company takes full responsibility of any part of operations undertaken.

When a company decides to concentrate on what it's best at, it decides to subcontract some of the process such as testing, manufacturing, development to a certain extent to a vendor company to reduce the overhead costs of the main company and make more efficient use of land, labour and resources for more important activities.

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50% BPO staffers smoke: Study

MUMBAI: A stressed-out youngster who works odd hours and is addicted to his cigarette. If that's your image of a BPO employee, it may not be too way off. "Smoking is common in BPOs," say doctors from cancer hub, Tata Memorial Hospital, who have recently launched an ambitious study to track the tobacco consumption patterns in four BPOs in the city.

The two-year-long study was launched in August 2007 and preliminary findings showed that more than 50% of employees turned to cigarettes during work hours.

Their concerns coincide with the growing emphasis on creating smoke-free environments, especially to keep youngsters away from passive smoke, which was the focus of the World Cancer Day observed on Monday.

While the BPOs in the study were no-smoking precincts, nothing stopped workers from taking a puff in their breaks, every two hours. So also, hookah bars nearby were also to blame for the addictive habit.

"Through the study, we are trying to understand why youngsters in BPOs who are generally educated and fall into the high income earning bracket take up smoking," said Dr Gauravi Mishra, consultant in preventive oncology at Tata Hospital.

As part of the study, doctors would also be initiating employees into behaviour therapy, pharmaco-therapy, education material and conducting focused group discussions to help workers kick the habit.

But it's not just youngsters in BPOs we need to worry about. Head of Tata Hospital's preventive oncology, Dr S Shastri pointed out how school children, too, were being initiated into tobacco, many being just passive smokers. This was an area of concern as cancer is already among India's leading killers with 8 lakh Indians being diagnosed with cancer every year. "We should have zero-tolerance when it comes to tobacco exposure for school children. Passive smoking is particularly harmful to the metabolism of children and pregnant women," he said.

The statistics were alarming. The Global Youth Tobacco Survey showed that a stunning 13% of school children were using tobacco in some form and one in three students lived in homes where someone smoked. Another doctor pointed out how children were more harmed as they inhaled more air and in turn more carcinogens.

Filmmaker and cancer survivor Anurag Basu joined the Tata doctors and Salaam Bombay Foundation in a smoke-free childhood campaign. He said, "When I was young, I thought it was macho to smoke. But looking back, I think one should be taught about the harmful effects of tobacco just as one is taught traffic rules, in school itself," he said. Basu was forced to quit smoking when he landed up in Tata hospital, years ago.

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ESO (Engineering Services Outsourcing)

ESO stands for Engineering Services Outsourcing.

Engineering Services Outsourcing (ESO) includes product design, research and development and other technical services across sectors like automotive, aerospace, hi-tech/telecom, utilities and construction/industrial machinery.

Spending on engineering services was $750 billion in 2004 and is projected to grow to $1.1 trillion globally by 2020, according to a recent Nasscom and Booz Allen Hamilton study - Globalisation Of Engineering Services - the next frontier for India.

ESO also stands for Educational Services Outsourcing. Education is a growing sector and the demand for Indian educators is on the rise. ESO market is estimated to be USD eight billion dollars and Indian teachers are currently offering services to countries like US, UK , Canada , and the Middle East. Though the main demand is from USA, newer markets of Netherlands and Europe too are fast opening up for Indian teachers.

Eastern Europe could soon become a favorite location for offshore outsourcing, with activity in the region estimated to triple between 2005 and 2008.

That’s according to consulting firm McKinsey, which predicts that the business process outsourcing (BPO) industry will support 130,000 jobs in the region by 2008.

Although only 1 percent of the world’s total BPO spending–worth $30 billion–is currently located in Eastern Europe, the region emerged as one of the favorite locations for Western European companies to invest in between 2004 and 2006.

McKinsey identifies three main advantages for companies locating BPO operations in Eastern Europe in the winter issue of McKinsey on IT.

The region offers low wage levels, comparable to India’s, with slow wage inflation looking likely to keep the region economically competitive for at least 15 years.

Also, compared with competing regions around the world, Eastern Europe is a relatively low-risk location for investing, due to the reliable infrastructure already in place.

The other benefit is the region’s geographical and cultural proximity to Western Europe, making the process of setting up offices much easier. There are also fewer language barriers compared with elsewhere, with German and French both being widely spoken.

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Essar arm to buy US BPO firm for $250m

BANGALORE: Aegis BPO, part of the Essar Group, is buying Nasdaq-listed offshore BPO provider PeopleSupport, in an all cash deal of $250 million through its Mauritius subsidiary Essar Services. The combined entity will have around 30,000 people and revenues of $500 million, making it India's biggest BPO after Genpact.

Under the terms of the agreement, Aegis BPO will pay PeopleSupport stockholders $12.25 per share, which represents a premium of about 29% over PeopleSupport's closing share price on August 1, and a premium of about 42% over the weighted average trading price of the company's shares during the previous 30 trading days.

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Citibank to beef up BPO subsidiary in RP

MANILA, Philippines--Financial services firm Citibank says it is ramping up its business process outsourcing (BPO) operations in the country in response to demand for customer support services worldwide.

Established in 2004, Citigroup Business Process Solutions (or Citigroup BPS) is a subsidiary of Singapore-based Citibank Overseas Investment Corp.

The Philippine subsidiary provides support services to Citibank's overseas operations including consumer banking and wealth management segments.

Citigroup BPS currently employs around 1,200 workers. The company announced a partnership with training school Excel Asia to provide agent-staffing services starting last January.

The company did not disclose specific numbers on how much workers it will need to add, noting that demand varies depending on client projects that come up different parts of the year.

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US slowdown puts BPO buyouts on fast track

MUMBAI: The BPO deal space for acquisitions is looking hot again after a lull for over the last six months. The US slowdown is pushing more third-party outsourcing firms and captive operations to sell out, according to industry players and investment bankers. Compared to the last quarter when both potential targets and buyers were in a wait-and-watch mode, large third-party BPO firms and integrated IT and BPO players are now keen on using their cash reserves to gain scale and new service lines, while potential targets that were holding out hoping for a recovery in their valuations are now interested in exiting before further value erosion happens Many of the smaller players which are unable to scale up are now looking to sell out. Some of the investors in these companies were planning to exit through IPOs but given the market conditions they cannot go IPO now. Many multinationals with captive back office operations of less than 5,000 people are also in the market,” said one large IT and BPO player. Read more News...

Talent crunch forces BPOs to dilute tasks

HYDERABAD: The Indian BPO job may be getting onto a factorylike assembly line chore. Similar to automobile shop floors, where jobs are broken down into miniscule tasks and processes demarcated step by step, BPO companies in India are experimenting of breaking a complex activity into numerous simple chores, to be easily performed by even school passouts. The dilution of task difficulty is primarily seen as a solution to talent crunch and a way to check attrition and battle wage inflation. Although it is not yet mainstream, if scaled up, it will throw up an opportunity for rural India to become the backoffice for BPO According to Nasscom vice-president Ameet Nivsarkar, “These experiments are being piloted by some BPO firms and the results are encouraging. We have to see how this can be scaled up. Essentially, this could help the BPO industry spread to tier II and III towns where smaller tasks can be offshored.” The BPO industry in India is currently centred around six metro cities in India which account for over 90% of the operations. Offshoring within India would capitalise on the vast rural and school dropout population. Says rural back office vehicle GramIT chief integrator Verghese Thomas, “Destinations like Dhaka and Philippines are becoming attractive as lowcost centres. There are 30 million 12th pass people in rural India who could be part of the rural BPO revolution.”

Honing BPO skills - BPO News

Getting the right talent to work for you, is like searching for the proverbial needle in the haystack. Who would know this better than BPO firm 24/7 Customer? The company has initiated several programmes as part of its corporate social responsibility initiatives to expand the base of professionals in the BPO industry.

Recent research and studies have shown that the BPO sector is going to face a talent shortage of about 262,000 professionals by 2012. Keeping this in mind, the company has chalked out CSR programmes which focus on empowering youth, providing them with equal opportunties and educating the underprivileged.

Take its 24/7 Ascend programme, for instance. Under this initiative, students are taught the skillsets needed for the BPO sector. The website www.247customer.com/ascend helps any student get free information on skills needed to join the BPO Industry.

They also have a career opportunity programme wherein common doubts that college students have in pursuing a career in the BPO industry are addressed. To improve the skillsets, courses on language/communication are provided and special study courses are also taken up. Career planning tools like interview tips, resume writing lessons, counselling on BPO careers and scholarship information are also offered.

For the academic staff in colleges and universities, 24/7 Customer offers special programmes (24/7 Varsity programme) to train students who are interested in pursuing a BPO career.

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BPO scales a new peak with version 3.0

NEW DELHI: Move over night long slogs on mundane outsourcing jobs. The $9-billion business process outsourcing (BPO) sector has graduated to the third generation services, or BPO Ver 3.0. Thanks to moving up the ladder many of the over 5,00,000 staff now see a meaningful career in outsourcing and companies are able to get tasks with higher billing rates. Sample the work in BPO 3.0: developing structured products for investment banks, using Monte Carlo simulation (statistical tools, in common lingo) based patent valuation, providing actionable legal and engineering reports for products that can be launched in multiple global markets and more.

This is far too complex from what the industry started with — that is, transcribing medical records, answering phone calls and data entry (BPO Ver 1.0). Later the firms graduated to doing problem solving and decision-making tasks such as processing insurance claims or enhancing limit on credit cards. That was BPO Version 2.0.

While the third version is being incorporated by BPOs over the last few months, it is still in its infancy. What distinguishes itself perhaps from the other versions is that the companies are recruiting experts with up to 15 years of experience and the higher billing rates.
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