Colombian Association of BPO

The Colombian Association of BPO, or BPrO, is the trade body for Colombia’s outsourcing, contact center, technology and back office firms. It speaks for over 100 member firms and helps them win work from buyers in the United States and Europe.

BPrO has represented the sector for more than 23 years, by its own account. Its members run contact center floors, business process outsourcing (BPO) delivery and back office work from Bogotá, Medellín, Cali and Barranquilla.

Buyers usually meet BPrO before they meet any individual provider. The association runs trade missions, publishes sector data and vouches for members on quality and compliance, which makes it a cheap first stop for a foreign procurement team.

Colombia’s pitch is not the lowest hourly rate — it is proximity. The country stays on UTC-5 all year with no daylight saving, so a Bogotá floor keeps the same clock as buyers in New York, Miami and Dallas.

Key takeaways

• BPrO speaks for more than 100 member companies across contact centers, technology outsourcing and back office services in Colombia.
• ProColombia’s Service Outsourcing profile puts sector employment above 705,000 jobs at the end of 2021.
• Colombian BPO exports passed USD 1.98 billion in 2021, a 26% rise on the year before, per that same profile.
• The United States, Spain, Mexico and Chile are named there as the main destinations for that export work.
• Colombia’s legal floor for handling personal data is the Habeas Data statute, Law 1581 of 2012.

How it works

BPrO works as a member funded trade association. Colombian firms pay dues and get policy representation, benchmarking data, training and market access in return. The board sets yearly priorities and works with state agencies on export growth.

Operations and funding

Members pay annual dues scaled to headcount and revenue. That pool funds a small permanent staff in Bogotá plus the specialist committees that do the technical work.

External grants from ProColombia and joint programs with the Ministry of Information Technologies and Communications (MinTIC) add capacity for export missions and workforce projects.

Both partners are worth naming precisely. ProColombia’s Service Outsourcing (BPO) sector profile carries the country level numbers, and MinTIC took its current shape under Law 1341 of 2009, Colombia’s ICT law.

Four core workstreams

• Policy advocacy on labor law, tax incentives and free trade zone status for outsourcing firms.
• Talent development, including bilingual training, university partnerships and certification schemes.
• Standards and compliance work covering service quality and personal data handling.
• Trade promotion, running buyer missions, trade shows and country brand campaigns for foreign clients.

Industry data

The figures below come from ProColombia’s Service Outsourcing (BPO) sector profile, which reports on 2021, plus BPrO’s own membership page.

Set those two revenue lines against each other and the shape of the market shows up. Exports of USD 1.98 billion out of USD 2.6 billion works out to roughly three quarters — an export business first, a domestic one second.

Standards and compliance work

BPrO co-authors voluntary codes on service quality and data handling. Colombia’s Habeas Data statute, Law 1581 of 2012, sets the legal floor for personal data processing across the country.

Enforcement does not sit with the association — Colombia’s data protection authority lives inside the Superintendency of Industry and Commerce, and that is the body a mishandled data set answers to.

So BPrO’s real job here is translation. It helps members map local controls onto buyer expectations from the United States, the United Kingdom and the European Union, so cross border contracts clear client audits without a scramble.

Examples

BPrO’s membership runs from multinational giants to Colombian born operators. You will find global contact center groups, homegrown information technology outsourcing (ITO) firms and customer service specialists, all using BPrO channels to reach foreign buyers.

• Konecta: Colombia’s largest homegrown BPO provider, which absorbed Comdata in 2022 to become one of Latin America’s biggest contact center groups.
• Teleperformance Colombia: the French owned multinational running large bilingual operations in Bogotá and Medellín for clients in the United States and Europe.
• Atento: a pan regional operator with Colombian delivery centers serving United States and Spanish market accounts across telecom and financial services.
• Sutherland and Concentrix: United States headquartered operators with Colombian sites focused on customer support and technical support work.

The Konecta and Comdata deal in 2022 shows what sits underneath the membership roster. Consolidation put a Colombian headquartered group into the top tier of Latin American contact center providers, and the association’s roster moved with it.

Engagement models for foreign buyers

Buyers usually enter Colombia through one of three routes, and BPrO members serve all three.

Direct contracting with a member handles most contact center and back office work. Ramp up is quick and you need no local entity, which is why most first time nearshore outsourcing programs start here.

Build operate transfer sits in the middle — a buyer stands up a captive site with local help, runs it under the provider’s licence for a fixed term, then takes ownership once hiring and attrition have settled.

Wholly owned captives count as foreign direct investment (FDI) and can qualify for a preferential income tax rate inside a declared free trade zone. BPrO helps buyers map those incentives before they commit capital.

Related terms

The terms below mark the edges of BPrO’s remit. They cover the delivery models its members sell and the investment vehicles foreign buyers use, but not the individual service lines, which sit on their own pages elsewhere in this glossary.

• Business Process Outsourcing: umbrella term for contracting non core business functions to a third party provider.
• Nearshore Outsourcing: delivery from a nearby country chosen for time zone and travel proximity rather than lowest cost.
• Contact Center: centralized operation handling inbound and outbound customer communication across voice and digital channels.
• Information Technology Outsourcing: delegation of software development, infrastructure or support work to an external provider.
• Foreign Direct Investment: cross border capital placed in physical operations, often through captive delivery centers.
• Customer Service: buyer facing support function that BPrO members deliver at scale from Colombian sites.

FAQ

Five questions come up most often when a foreign buyer meets BPrO for the first time. The short answers below cover the name, the membership, the nearshore case, the data rules and the head office.

What does BPrO stand for?

BPrO is the brand short form of the Asociación Colombiana de BPO, rendered in English as the Colombian Association of BPO. It represents business process outsourcing, contact center and technology services firms operating in Colombia.

How many companies belong to BPrO?

BPrO’s own membership page says more than 100 companies are associated with it. The roster shifts each year as members join and consolidations reshape the sector, so ask for the current list rather than trusting any published count.

Is Colombia a good nearshore option for US buyers?

It is strong on proximity. Colombia stays on UTC-5 year round and has a deep bilingual workforce. ProColombia’s Service Outsourcing profile also names the United States among the main destinations for Colombian BPO exports.

Does BPrO enforce data-protection rules?

No, regulators do. The association helps members align with Colombia’s Habeas Data statute, Law 1581 of 2012, plus buyer requirements from the European Union and the United States. It publishes guidance and runs training rather than issuing penalties.

Where is BPrO headquartered?

BPrO is based in Bogotá, with member operations concentrated there and in Medellín, Cali and Barranquilla.

Ready to shortlist Colombian BPO partners? Talk to Outsource Accelerator for a vetted nearshore scoping call.