Business Process Outsourcing (BPO) Philippines

Philippine president Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo is looking for a 40% growth in the country’s Business Process Outsourcing (BPO) industry for 2008.

Speaking at the e-Services Global Sourcing Conference and Exhibition, Arroyo said while the Philippines currently employ 300,000 people in the BPO and contact center industry, she wants these increased by at least 40% to meet the growing demand worldwide. She said the Philippines at present is only second to India in terms of supplying the workforce in the BPO industry, but it has already been recognized as the “premiere global destination for these types of IT enabled services”.

“We are proud of what we had achieved but we are anxious to solidify our gains. We’re anxious not to be complacent in the face of rapid change,” Arroyo said. “For 2008, we have targeted to grow our O & O (offshore and outsourcing) workforce by 40% in order to cope with the industry demands and also to achieve a 40% growth rate in the O & O sector.”

The City of Manila has been named the second top Business Process Outsourcing (BPO) destination in the Asia-Pacific region by the International Data Corporation (IDC), just three months after the Philippines was named as the ‘Offshoring Destination of the Year‘ by the United Kingdom’s National Outsourcing Association last October.

In the IDC list, Manila was ranked no. 2, second only to Bangalore, India.

Three other Philippine cities have been included by the London Financial Times in the survey of ‘Top Ten Asian Cities of the Future‘, thus validating the country’s position as a major player in the global offshoring and outsourcing (O&O) market.

Quezon City ranked 7th, Cebu 8th and Davao 10th in the survey commissioned by the London Times, comparable with cities like Hongkong, Singapore and Taipei which were the top three.

President Gloria-Macapagal-Arroyo announced that her administration has targeted a 40% growth rate in the country’s O&O sector for this year and 40% growth target in the workforce “in order to cope with the industry demands”.

“These distinctions from the O&O sector and global ICT firms provide our investor friends, who have come to E-services Philippines, with objective third party assessments of our O&O capabilities,” the President stressed.

According to the President, the runaway growth of the O&O industry has echoed throughout the entire system, spawning impressive growth on other sectors like real estate, telecommunications, food and retail among others.