Today, the San Francisco Chronicle published this interview with Infosys CEO, S. Gopalakrishnan: Pioneer in the field of global outsourcing. Infosys is one of the world’s largest outsoucing companies, with more than 91,000 employees, 40 offices worldwide, and $4 billion dollars in revenue.
As a relatively young business process outsourcing (BPO) provider, we found this interview particularly interesting. In it, S. Gopalakrishnan traces the growth of Infosys from its early years:
I think of ‘81 through ‘91 as the surviving ascent company, surviving to establish a viable business. This is the period when the Indian economy was almost closed and it was a very different era. So we struggled a lot. We didn’t have much to show for all that struggle. We hardly grew. I think in 1991 we would probably have had about a million dollars in revenue, something like that.
In ‘91, the economy opened up. We did an initial public offering in ‘93 and invested that money into the business. That was the period of building the foundation of the company, of a stable organization – working systems, processes, lots of things we did to create a strong foundation for growth.
And then in ‘99 – helped by the Y2K boom, the telecom boom and the Internet boom – we began growing more than 100 percent year over year. That’s been our period of accelerated growth. It took us 23 years to get to the first billion, 23 months for the second billion, 12 months for the third billion and so on.
Looking forward, S. Gopalakrishnan notes continued opportunities for growth:
The reason why we continue to grow is that our market share is very, very low. We have only about 500 clients. There are a lot of companies that we don’t work with. So there is still opportunity for growth.
The outsourcing ”pie” is projected to offer growing oppportunities for offshore IT/BPO providers in other countries as well. You can imagine how exciting this prospect is for an emerging BPO such as ourselves. Infosys is a model of success that we certainly hope to emulate in the coming years.
Filed under: Our TPL Team Members
If you haven’t been to the About page of our website yet, here are some interesting facts about our BPO staff:
- 83% are female
- 75% are between 23-25 years old
- 32% graduated with majors in English and 24% with majors in Business Administration
- 69% are currently pursuing or have obtained a second degree (undergraduate and graduate)
- 28% of those pursuing second degrees are obtaining degrees in English, 22% in Business Administration, and 17% in Economics
- 70% are pursuing or have pursued additional English courses outside of work
A Few of Our BPO Professionals!
We collected this information a few weeks ago, after conducting an in-house survey on staff development. We were just as surprised as you may be to learn that 69% of staff were pursuing or have obtained a second degree. It’s just another indication of how motivated our BPO staff are. We don’t know how they balance a full-time work schedule with school but we’re really proud of them!
An article today in BusinessWeek, Indian BPOs Don’t Fear US Recession, reports:
A study conducted this year by Nasscom and research firm Everest estimates “conservatively” that between 2008 and 2012, the industry will see a compounded annual growth rate (CAGR) of 28-30%. But it believes this could go up to as high as 45-50 % if supply constraints are eased.
Nasscom is the trade body and chamber of commerce of the IT-BPO industry in India, so the statistics above report specifically on Indian providers. Howevever, these growth rates suggest strong opportunities for other offshore destinations as well, for instance, China, the Phillipines, Eastern Europe, Central America, and of course, Vietnam (where we’re based), who may be able to capitalize on the appreciating Rupee and wage inflation.
Of further interest to us in the article:
Within India, the focus is moving to smaller towns. Nasscom would like to create a new layer in the educational sector to help BPOs. “We can’t keep doing training in-house. We need independent schools to teach the kind of things BPOs need,” says [Nasscom President Som] Mittal.
Anticipating aggressive growth in the coming year, we’re starting to explore similar proposals in Vietnam with peer companies and nearby universities. We’ll report on this possible endeavor as information becomes available.
Filed under: Advantages/Disadvantages of Outsourcing/BPO, Outsourcing in the News
This week, InformationWeek published a 30-page report on the results of a reader poll focused on business process outsourcing. Author Ivan Schneider, writes:
“Saving money is still the No. 1 goal of business process outsourcing, though a notable minority sees it as a tool for strategic change.”
At TPL, we tell prospective clients that cost savings are an important advantage of BPO, however, it’s not the only reason. Companies should also look to BPO in order to increase efficiencies and reduce resource/management burden.
Companies who view BPO as a “tool for strategic change” are the companies we like to target. Any new BPO partnership requires a sizable initial investment of time and resources, for the client and the provider. So to be sustainable, it’s got to be a long-term win-win for both parties.
Aside from cutting costs (cited by 83%), other reasons companies consider BPO are:
- Improving efficiency (73%)
- Shifting internal focus to innovation and new projects (55%)
- Improving time-to-market (42%)
- Tapping lower-cost offshore labor (53%)
- Concentrating on core capabilities (54%)
- Expanding into new business (20%)
More key drivers for BPO are available in the report. You can download and read the rest of it here. Happy reading!
Filed under: Advantages/Disadvantages of Outsourcing/BPO, Clients, Conferences & Exhibitions
We’re back in Vietnam after a great trip to Chicago for the IRCE trade show (see previous entry below). We spent a day exploring the city, a day setting up, and 3 days on the floor talking to IRCE attendees about our BPO solutions.
On the floor, we met representatives from all types of internet retailers: start-up to established, B2B to B2C, family-run to public corporations – selling a vast array of products, from nail salon supplies, sports equipment, glass tiles, shoes, military uniforms, and so much more!
The IRCE 2008 Exhibit Hall Floor
This being our first trade show, it was really interesting to see the diversity of businesses represented and their range in openness to BPO. Many of the attendees we talked to seemed thoroughly interested in what we offer: BPO solutions that save their businesses time and money and unload repetitive processes and management burden. Others were already outsourcing: mostly to India and a couple to Eastern Europe and South America.
Others weren’t so convinced: common objections included: “We’re too small” or “We prefer to do it all in-house.” Of course, we know that outsourcing can be a foreign concept to many (no pun intended!) and we’ve got firm rebuttals for all these objections which we’ll get into in another entry.
Overall, the show was a great success for us, bringing in over 100 new leads. Since last Thursday, we’ve been following up on our strongest leads and have already been given sample projects to work on for review by prospective clients. It’s exciting, indeed. More to come on these developments in the future.
The launch of this blog is timed with the launch of our new website – and our first big marketing push in the US, where most of our clients are based. That’s going to be taking place next Monday-Thursday at the 4th annual Internet Retailer and Conference Exhibition (IRCE) in Chicago, Illinois.
Four of us will be catching a 20-hour flight this Friday morning out of Ho Chi Minh City’s airport. We’ll be attending the IRCE show as exhibitors, and manning the TPL booth at the IRCE exhibition hall, along with hundreds of other internet retailer solutions providers.
(Included in our group is one young Vietnamese staff by the name of Thu. She’s been with us for over three years and now serves as one of two staff supervisors. Thu’s never left the country before, so you can imagine how excited she is – and how excited we are for her! )
We’ve been preparing for this huge show over the past several months. Our goal at IRCE is to increase awareness about TPL, specifically for internet retailers. And, as we’ve been working with several internet retailers already – taking over business processes such as photo editing, order processing, and product listings – we know we can make a really strong case for our BPO services.
Stay tuned for a post from the exhibition floor!
Filed under: Clients
Hi everybody! Welcome to our company blog, TPL Inside Outsourcing. We’re pretty excited about this new endeavor and are looking forward to engaging current and potential customers through this format.
Chances are, you’ve already browsed through our website or are already familiar with our services, so we won’t go into those details in this welcome post. If you haven’t already, you can go to the About section of our website to find out who we are.
So, what’s this blog about and why have we created it?
Our first goal is to provide another channel for our current clients to access and communicate with us. We think our clients might be interested in hearing about new services, learn more about the people at TPL they’re working with, and in general, keep up to date with news that’s relevant to our partnerships.
Our second goal is to engage potential customers or others who may be interested/curious about business process outsourcing solutions, and, to the extent that we can, demystify the process and outsourcing in general.
In this blog we’ll be covering topics such as: 1) outsourcing solutions that work for our clients, 2) our thoughts on outsourcing trends or business developments in Vietnam (where we’re based), and last but not least 3) who we are, such as staff and training.
This is just a flavor of things to come – and we’re sure that this list of topics will grow. So, again… welcome!
