The Outsourcing Week in Review: Wednesday, January 27, 2021

Welcome to Inside Outsourcing: The Outsourcing Week in Review

THE WEEK IN REVIEW

Investment agencies Board of Investments (BoI) and the Philippine Economic Zone Authority (Peza) are both setting hefty targets for the all-important foreign direct investments (FDI) for 2021. Trade Secretary Ramon Lopez instructed Undersecretary and BOI Managing Head Ceferino Rodolfo to target P1.2 trillion in investments this year. However, PEZA established a humbler investment target of exceeding P100 billion this year. PEZA Director General Charito Plaza said the agency is leveling up its efforts by working with both public and private stakeholders to get existing locators to stay and/or even expand operations.

Business process outsourcing (BPO) firms are exploring all opportunities to go back to their pre-pandemic operations as soon as possible. Major BPOs Concentrix and Alorica joined VXI Philippines on the list of firms to offer free COVID-19 vaccinations to its Filipino employees. Concentrix is set to offer free vaccinations to its 100,000 staff, while Alorica will provide for its 80,000 employees. Last week, Inside Outsourcing also reported that VXI will deliver free COVID vaccinations to its 20,000 workers as a part of the growing public private partnership championed by Go Negosyo.

This week, Globe Telecom triumphantly announced that 80 per cent of Metro Manila now has 5th Generation (5G) outdoor coverage, adding that business districts Bonifacio Global City and Ortigas already have 97 per cent 5G coverage, while Makati has 95 per cent. The first thing we all did on hearing the news was to check our phones – did you?

Faster internet continues to be a foundational requirement of the burgeoning outsourcing industry. Professional networking website LinkedIn recently released the “Jobs on the Rise” report, which projects that Southeast Asia in 2021 will see a significant surge in the demand for the following career categories: digital content; data analyst; software and technology; e-commerce; and customer service, among others.

Property consultancy firm Lobien Realty Group (LRG) has forecasted a 25 to 30 per cent decrease in office rental rates this year, “unless the business process outsourcing industry would come back right away and expand, and the COVID-19 vaccine would be rolled out in the market.” However, the country’s economy is projected to revert to its pre-pandemic level expansion by next year. Standard Chartered Bank economist for Asia Chidu Narayanan expects the Philippine domestic growth “to be about 6.5%.”

More BPOs are confidently gearing up for workforce expansion this year. Leading Davao-based outsourcing provider SixEleven BPO is continuing its fast growth and looking to hire additional professionals to work from their Davao City and General Santos offices. The firm is adding loan support professionals, customer service representatives, contract managers, and Spanish-speaking representatives to join their team. In addition, cloud staffing pioneer  Cloudstaff held its first ever virtual career fair, the “Bounce Back Virtual Career Fair” on January 23. The firm aims to help “those who encountered a career setback last year” by providing a number of exciting career opportunities. TOA Global kicked off the new year by announcing the growth of its senior leadership team to respond to its continued expansion. The fast growing Clark-based accounting specialist BPO boosted its senior leadership team by six people positioned across the globe to steer its 2021 strategy.

Overseas, global outsourcing leader Accenture recently acquired Argentinian digital solutions provider Wolox to strengthen their “ability to help clients accelerate business transformation using cloud technologies and deliver measurable business value.” Teleperformance is also expanding its Europe offices, as it plans on adding another 400 to 500 new positions for foreign language speakers in its Romania office this year.

Multinational beverage corporation Coca-Cola’s bottling arm, Coca-Cola Beverages Philippines Inc. (CCBPI), this week jump started a proposed series of bullish investments by opening its new distribution center in Manila. The new facility will be a model site for Coca-Cola globally and will stimulate job opportunities in the city as it proposes to hire hundreds of Manila residents.

In this week’s episode of the Outsource Accelerator Podcast, former Department of Information and Communications Technology (DICT) undersecretary Monchito Ibrahim said he continues to see a “tremendous potential” for the Philippines to really become a global hub for analytics services, data science, and data engineering.

In a proud Inside Outsourcing moment, Ibrahim also commended Outsource Accelerator’s CEO Derek Gallimore for his contributions to the Philippine BPO industry: “You’ve been actively helping even the small [BPO companies], connect[ing] them to global markets. And this has tremendously helped our homegrown BPO companies to really scale up their growth not just in the Philippines, but globally.”

>>> Got any burning news? Share your industry hot scoops and company press releases with Inside Outsourcing – the world’s leading outsourcing news hub.

Wednesday, January 27, 2021

NEWS THIS WEEK

26 January 2021

• SYKES recognized as ‘BPO Company of the Year’ for third consecutive time – read article…
• US leadership change to have positive impact in PH – read article…
• PH economy to recover by next year – read article…

25 January 2021

• PEZA hopes to achieve over P100bn investments in 2021 – read article…
• Coca-Cola expands investment plans in Manila – read article…
• SixEleven gears for expansion this 2021 – read article…

22 January 2021

• Teleperformance to add up to 500 more employees in Romania – read article…
• 80% of Metro Manila now 5G-ready – read article…
• Cloudstaff to hold ‘Bounce Back Virtual Career Fair’ – read article…
• PH got ‘tremendous potential’ as an analytics global hub – Ibrahim – read article…

21 January 2021

• TOA Global expands its senior leadership team by six – read article…
• Metro Manila’s office rental rates to drop 30%, unless BPO sector “comes back” – read article…
• Loss of 24% of BPO, electronics jobs projected by 2030 – read article…
• Concentrix, Alorica, to provide free COVID-19 vaccines to employees – read article…

20 January 2021

• PH sees security ties with US continuing under Biden – read article…
• Accenture acquired Argentinian digital solutions provider Wolox – read article…
• BOI, PEZA eye different investment goals in 2021 – read article…
• Digital services, technical specialists fastest growing jobs in SEA – read article…

Read more Inside Outsourcing Newsletters here:

1. The Outsourcing Week in Review: January 20, 2021
2. The Outsourcing Week in Review: February 3, 2021