Beyond call centers... BPO's need to look for value added service clients.

A report points to the ideas of The National Economic Development Authority which says - it wants companies to diversify outsourcing work and services "beyond call centers" and for employers to "take advantage of the job opportunities presented by other business process outsourcing companies.". The shift can be to higher value added to higher levels of work that will allow people to use ore higher billing services offered and compete more on the global market in areas like drafting, design, accounting, puiblishing, graphics design, website support and mangement.
Much of this can be focused in areas that seek employment and need only the proper broadband environment to build up the pool of avaialbe workers. But there-in lies the catch much of the infrastructure in the country is at best T1 level or 100MBPS .

While a new higher level of fiber cable to bring to Country up to full T3 standards has been laid out to Batangas - the new connection will primarily be focused on regional providers and large scale users of data stream services.

What is needed is for government to take the iniative - make available to other regions programs and projects to upgrade all major cities at least to a T1 or T3 level for the three major metropolitan areas.

This could fuel a shift to "home source" or telecommute services for workers on larger jobscale pool. meaning by laying out the infrastructure- more and more people could be available for work on larger scale and more people could be seen as accesible to the world wide web.

the infrastructure is there - but - the gateways are charing too much to allow for wider access.
not realizing that by lessening costs they can fuel the same income thrust that fueled the telco's massive growth and income with sms mesaaging.

Now while- NEDA Director-General Romulo Neri feels that " call centers are at the forefront of the outsourcing industry, " and is showing the entry of other players in the industry as major facotrs. Such as with the entry of "BPO companies such as HP Global delivery Center, Manulife and Deutsche Knowledge Services." He said that more jobs and careers can be offered "the educated workforce of the country as these companies are hiring language-proficient professionals in Information Communication Technology and finance sectors. "

The 2006 forecast of the Board of Investments, Business Process Association of the Philippines and the Commission on Information, Communication and Technology show " That outsourcing jobs will rise by 44 percent, revenues by 52 percent and investments by 42 percent.

That means "Around 233,000 Filis are now employed by outsourcing companies. The number is expected to reach 1.2 million by 2010." In my view that is a consrvative estimate-

" A study conducted by McKinsey Global Consultancy shows that there are at least 120 outsourcing companies in the country today, and projects that by 2010, revenues from BPO will reach $10 billion. According to industry estimates, the country's revenues from BPO in 2006 will bring in $3.8 billion, almost four times higher than in 2001 at $1 billion. In Bacolod City, three call centers will start operations this year - Teleperformance, I/O Asia and Focus Communications. The Bacolod IT Team said that aside from call center agents, also in demand are accountants, data encoders and software developers.*

Story quotes Daily Star- Visayas