Starting an Indian Call Center: The Purple Case Study

Ecommercetimes.com
"Retention is the number one issue in the Indian call center industry," said Mark Lewitt, an American operations manager for Mumbai-based Godrej Upstream. "The industry in India states that the yearly turnover of agents is around 30 percent, when the on-the-ground reality is that the rate is much, much higher," Lewitt said, adding, "It is closer to 60 percent." more...

Patni expands European operations

Patni Press release
Patni Computer Systems, Ltd., a global IT services provider, announced today the opening up of its new office in Amsterdam. This will be Patni’s fifth office in Europe, after Germany (Stuttgart and Munich), Sweden and the UK. Patni had previously identified the Benelux region as a key market in the EU. The Amsterdam office will be primarily responsible for addressing this market by introducing Patni’s capabilities and service offerings to leading corporations in the region. more...

Alsbridge, the Premier Outsourcing and Insourcing Advisory Firm, Presents at "The 12th M&A Advisor Conference Expo"

PRWeb
Alsbridge, the premier global outsourcing and insourcing advisory firm announced today that Ben Trowbridge, Managing Partner of Alsbridge – North America, will participate in the panel session entitled, "Make Sure it Adds Up: Valuation and Accounting" on the first day of the conference, June 27, from 2:00-3:00 pm at the Drake Hotel in Chicago, IL. His participation in the panel session will offer M&A executives key insight into the use of offshore resources to drive down SG&A costs in acquisitions.The mergers of large companies typically involve extremely complex IT and BPO components, but the companies involved often consider these to be primarily M&A transactions. The legal and business teams involved in the merger or acquisition need to consider the motivations inherent in outsourcing transactions and the methodologies and structures required to achieve success. The strategic imperatives in M&A transactions present challenges and opportunities to outsourcing providers that go far beyond simply reducing costs. more...

Move Over, India: The Shifting Geography of Offshore Outsourcing Creates New Challengers

Informit.com
The consultants at A.T. Kearney who compile a widely followed annual survey of the world's actual and potential off-shore locations for business-process outsourcing (BPO) expect to make some changes for 2005. The most remarkable of the changes is likely to be a quantum leap in the number of countries vying for this back-office work, which increasingly is being outsourced by U.S., Western European and Japanese companies. The 2004 survey ranked 25 countries - a list led by BPO pioneer India - based on three broad categories - people skills and availability; business environment, and financial structure - and a variety of sub-categories. As many as 40 countries are being considered for next year's list, says Janet Pau, policy analyst in Alexandria, Va., for A.T. Kearney's Global Business Policy Council, a roundtable for corporate chief executives. more...

Outsourcing industry at the crossroads

Economic Times
Order books of software exporters are full and the guidance for the remaining period of the year looks positive. CEOs talk of India becoming the de-facto destination for software offshoring. The list of companies waiting to jump onto the offshore bandwagon is increasing. Signs, which on the surface, looks rosy for the Indian software service exporters. more...

Learning to read India

Asia Times
When future corporate leaders of the world make a country their subject of study, it's a measure of its rising economic fortunes. Indians heading to the West to study is old story. American and European students treading across to India is a more recent phenomenon. Until recently, most such students would be mainly drawn to Oriental subjects such as Sanskrit, spirituality, yoga, Ayurveda or Indian dance and music forms. But this is now changing. The Indian software sector, with earnings of $22 billion (exports over $17 billion) last year, is one enterprise in which the country has emerged as a clear leader. Thus topping the list of must-understand for Western managers are the two information technology (IT) giants, Wipro and Infosys, which have been at the vanguard of India's software revolution. Both firms have witnessed a huge jump in the number of international management students seeking to make them part of their project coursework. more...

Goldman Sachs to invest $30m in Indian offshore facility

Finextra.com
US investment bank Goldman Sachs plans to outsource more middle and front office functions to India as part of a $30m investment in building up its offshore services facilities. David Simons, head of the Bangalore centre, told Reuters reporters that the bank plans to to increase the number of staff employed at the unit to 800 by the end of the year. He expects headcount at the unit to reach 1000 "very quickly", although future expansion would depend on business growth. The Bangalore centre, which was established last year, is able to house up to 1500 staff. The bank says the centre is not a back office processing unit but is focused on the front and middle office and employs a wide range of workers including accountants, equity researchers, treasury staff and IT professionals. more...

OUTSOURCING AMERICA

California Job Journal
If you are a US worker, you don’t have to read too many pages of the new book Outsourcing America (by Ron & Anil Hira, AmaCom Books) to feel a chill down your spine. In fact, just scanning the opening sentences on the book jacket may be enough to make you queasy: "In the debate over outsourcing, one fact is clear: Most companies believe they can save a tremendous amount of money by shipping American jobs overseas. They no longer see outsourcing as an option but rather as an imperative. Consequently, as many as 14 million white-collar jobs are vulnerable . . . "By 2015, analysts forecast that $151 billion in wages will be outsourced to foreign workers. Even for highly skilled and specialized jobs in technology, financial and legal services, and other disciplines, a cheaper workforce is ready to be tapped somewhere in the world." more...

Indians earn more than Chinese bros

Economic Times
Average compensation paid to Indian techies, both new hires and managers is not vastly different from what their counterparts earn in China, the other emerging competitive offshore destination in Asia. It is much lower in Vietnam, often talked about as a possible threat to India. The average annual entry level salary in India is $5443 and $13124 is what a manager with 5 to 8 year experience earns. It is almost similar in China where freshers are paid $5460 and experienced hires $13732. Salary in Vietnam is much lower. Freshers are paid $3276, while experienced hires get $8571. more...

One in five outsourcing deals are terminated

Silicon.com
One in five organisations outsourcing their IT has terminated the contract during the last year after failing to get the expected benefits, according to a new study. But the study of 182 IT outsourcing buyers in the US claims the overall level of satisfaction has increased as the market matures and IT bosses have more realistic expectations. Almost three-quarters (74 per cent) said they are happy with their IT outsourcing efforts to date and out of the 21 per cent who terminated a deal in the last 12 months, half of those simply switched to another vendor. Only a quarter of those who terminated then brought the work back in-house. more...