Business Process Outsourcing (BPO) is the leveraging of technology or specialist process vendors to provide and manage an organization’s critical and/or non-critical enterprise processes and applications. A common example of BPO is functionalities in the areas of call centers, human resources, accounting etc.

BPOs are common in Pakistan, especially as a career amongst the relatively large population of fluent English speakers. Many of these workers comprise the youth of the country and they take up even part-time jobs at call centers as these are often the best paying jobs they can find. The primary advantage that BPO providers enjoy in Pakistan is the relatively low cost of labor, which has been estimated to be 30% cheaper than the neighboring country.<ref>The Buying Triangle, LLC, 2006</ref>

Other attractions include low corporate taxes and inexpensive infrastructure. Time zone differences have also been of advantage to certain offshore outsourcing setups.

Pakistan’s BPO sector has seen double-digit growth in the number of agents employed in voice-based call center work over the past year, including both domestic and international call centers. At this point, there are approximately 119 international call centers and more than 30 domestic call centers in Pakistan employing approximately 5000 agents. The majority of these call centers have operations in major cities such as Karachi, Lahore and Islamabad.

Call Centers serving international customers are an important segment of the Pakistani IT-enabled Services market. However, the training institutes set up currently in the country are of varying quality. To counter this, Pakistan Software Export Board has recently embarked upon a project that has allowed a number of these call center training institutes to be eligible for subsidies. This, in turn is being channeled as benefits to trainees in the form of reduced fees.

Opportunities in Pakistan

With the current incentives and policies developed for the BPO sector investors by the Government of Pakistan, there are certainly much opportunities for the investors to capitalize on what Pakistan has to offer.

The Government of Pakistan has worked towards encouraging foreign investment in Pakistan’s technology sectors, of which BPO is at the forefront. The result has been an almost 100% growth rate in the country’s ICT sector with BPO firms being exceptionally successful in segments such as Accounts, Medical Transcription, Legal Services, Data Entry and Call Centers.

With PTCL being privatized and general customs tariffs being reduced dramatically in order to encourage investment, BPO firms have seen large scale growth in not only attaining clients in Western countries such as US, UK and France but also in Pakistan. A number of firms have had success in harnessing giants such as Habib Bank Limited (HBL), National Bank Limited, Pakistan International Airlines (PIA), Government of Punjab, Dawood Cement, Atlas Honda, etc., as clients. As a result, the public relations and customer services of these companies have improved dramatically and more contracts are being provided to BPO firms.

BPO firms have also been provided with enthusiastic support from the Government of Pakistan, which is trying its best to make the regions of Balochistan and NWFP conducive to investment. At present, the Board of Investment (BoI) is establishing investment facilitation centers in Quetta and Peshawar. This move is aimed at facilitating prospective investors in fast tracking their services in these cities.

Another significant development undertaken so far has been the road, linking Gawadar Port with parts of northern Pakistan. It is hoped to contribute to a better investment climate and to further strengthen national integrity, easing the pressure on Karachi which is currently the main port. Gawadar offers the opportunity for organizations in Balochistan and NWFP to bring their technology directly into the province without routing them through Karachi.

Values

In Pakistan, BPO companies are constantly providing efficient and quality services to their clients by using the latest technological tools. They provide solutions catering to a large market and sector and not just limited domain of one particular industry.

BPO firms operating in the major cities of the country provide speedy services to their clients while ensuring that the information is efficient and up-to-date. Firms that deal in medical and legal transcriptions are at the very heart of ensuring that the information is not outdated or corrupt in any manner or form. That is why BPO companies have been in constant engagement talks with the Government of Pakistan to come up with a data protection act which covers information security, data encryption, cyber-crime, data law suits, etc. It is in the best interests of both the country and the BPO sector for this to be done as soon as possible as this will remove any reservations that the foreign clients might have regarding information and its security.

Apart from assuring foreign clients with issues regarding information security, efficiency and delivery, BPO firms have also taken steps to be in constant touch with the latest trends in various market areas, especially when it comes to telemarketing. This is critical when it comes to firms being knowledgeable of what consumers are looking for. Such knowledge enables the firms to promote services and products aimed at earning the designated revenue targets.

Niche Areas & World Class Companies

Demonstrating world class competitiveness and creativity, Pakistan boasts several renowned product and service companies. A number of Pakistan’s companies have performed exceptionally well in domestic as well as international markets, making illustrious success stories in niche areas such as telecommunications, including wireless networks, banking, social networking, and healthcare software.

External links

Articles

Pakistan raring to go in IT sector, Exclusive News Report on BBC News by Santosh Sinha, 24 August 2007

Pakistan: A significant IT player, Exclusive News Report on BBC Urdu by Santosh Sinha, 14 August 2007

Pakistan outsourcing industry, by John Ribeiro, Washington Post, 20 August 2007

Pakistan aiming for a larger share of outsourcing, by John Ribeiro, Computer World-Singapore, 10 August 2007

Pakistan Outsourcing Industry, by John Ribeiro, Network World Magazine, 17 August 2007

SERVICES Outsourcing Industry of Pakistan, by John Ribeiro, Info World, 17 August 2007

Pakistan aims for a larger share of outsourcing, by John Ribeiro, IT World Canada, 22 August 2007

Pakistan Seeks Tech Role, by John Ribeiro, PC World, 19 August 2007

Pakistan Seeks Tech Role, by John Ribeiro, ABC News, 19 August 2007

Pakistani, Irish IT Firms Keen to Enhance Cooperation, Yahoo! Finance - Singapore, 23 November 2007

Pakistan Software Export Board to Boost Equity Base of IT Cos, Yahoo! Finance - Singapore, 30 November 2007

Despite politics, Pakistanis ride the IT wave, Japan Herald, 23 October 2007

Despite politics, Pakistanis ride the IT wave, By Karen Yap Lih Huey, ZD Net India, 23 October 2007

Gartner Ranks Top 30 Countries for Offshore IT Services, By Stephanie Overby, CIO, 11 December 2007