Philippines Favoured For BPO

by media journalist

Asia Pulse - American companies looking for outsourcing partners in OutsourceWorld New York have cited the Philippines strong affinity with the Western culture as the country's distinct advantage in business process outsourcing (BPO).

The Philippines unique selling proposition is it is the closest to American in Asia. Americans in general find the Filipinos easy to work with compared to other countries in Asia, according to American outsourcing expert Richard Mills, chairman of Chalre
Associates Executive Search.

As a previous US colony, much of the Philippines' social, political and educational
system was patterned after the US.

American English was taught to young Filipino students and even the basic form of
government was patterned after the American model.

The Philippines track record and roster of major international companies with operations in the country likewise left a positive impression to American firms in OutsourceWorld New York which are interested to outsource in the Philippines. 

According to Senior Trade Undersecretary Thomas G. Aquino, also the head of delegation of the US trade mission, Many American companies were surprised to know that a number of Fortune 500 companies are already using the Philippines as outsourcing destination of their non-core functions such as financial and accounting
services, human resources, logistics, content management and publisher services.

Some of the well-known American brands with outsourcing projects in the Philippines are American Express, FedEx, Intel, Microsoft, Dell, Kodak, General Motors, MCI, Procter & Gamble, and Verizon among others.

Firms outsource in the Philippines because of the English language capability and
competitive IT skills of its people, government support to IT services, and reliable telecom infrastructure.

As more and more US firms focus on core competencies, opportunities abound for
niche back office services. 

"We saw opportunities in outsourcing application support and maintenance, technical support, business analysis, accounting, HR, insurance processing, bank processing, medical transcription, legal services, animation and other non-core back office processes," added Aquino. 

Programa Technologias Informacion of the Fundacion Chile said that the solid English speaking contact center industry presents partnership opportunities with Chile for the Spanish-speaking requirements of Philippine US clients.

The Philippines was represented by 17 BPO companies in OutsourceWorld New York, namely ADEC Solutions, Inc., Advanced Contact Solutions, Inc., Ambergris Solutions, Inc., Berthaphil Business Park, Business Process Outsourcing International, Inc. (BPOi), Comfac Global Group, Diversified Technology Solutions International, Inc. (DTSI), Eximius BPO Services Inc., Exist Software, Pointwest Technologies Corporation, Quisumbing Torres, SENCOR, Teledata Philippines, Inc., Transprocure Corporation and Virtual Assistants. Telco giants Innove Communications and the Philippine Long Distance Telephone Company (PLDT) are supporting the project as sponsors.

The Philippine participation in OutsourceWorld New York and ICT Business Mission
to the US is organized by the Department of Trade and Industry through the Center
for International Trade Expositions and Missions (CITEM), Board of Investments (BOI) and Foreign Trade Service Corps, in coordination with the Business Processing Association of the Philippines (BPAP). 

The United States remains the Philippines' primary source market for outsourced business processes and contact center services.

It is also the world's largest source of IT enabled services (ITES) outsourced
contracts and accounts for 44 per cent of the global total. This figure is expected to
increase by 60 per cent in 2008.

"When there is a robust growth of the economy, there is an increase in IT spending.
Now, we are seeing more inquiries, more business visits, more projects," Aquino said.

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