Silicon Investor (SI) -- The First Internet Community

STOCKTALK

We've detected that you're using an ad content blocking browser plug-in or feature. Ads provide a critical source of revenue to the continued operation of Silicon Investor. We ask that you disable ad blocking while on Silicon Investor in the best interests of our community. If you are not using an ad blocker but are still receiving this message, make sure your browser's tracking protection is set to the 'standard' level.

Strategies & Market Trends : China Warehouse- More Than Crockery -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: RealMuLan who wrote (2150)	12/19/2003 3:08:11 PM
From: RealMuLan	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 6370

Low-cost India becoming call centre to the world By Channel NewsAsia's India Correspondent Atul Jolly Multinational companies have been moving certain corporate functions to countries like India in an effort to save costs. But not everyone is happy. In fact, outsourcing has given rise to job losses in the West, making the issue a hot political potato for some governments. From data entry to tax returns, medical transcription to development services -- multinational companies are transferring their non-core business functions to external service providers. And India has been at the forefront lapping up these lucrative contracts. Already 250 of the Fortune 1,000 companies have outsourced their work to India because of several attractive factors. India offers huge cost savings, to the tune of 50-60 percent for the same process done in the developed countries. India also offers better quality in services and stiff competition is pushing more and more companies to establish their call centres in India. What is more, telecom facilities have been improving, while the government has provided 100 percent tax exemption on foreign direct investment in IT-enabled services. And, of course, there is a readily-available pool of over 25 million English-speaking graduates and 120,000 engineers added every year. These factors have allowed India to gain a huge advantage over other Asian outsourcing destinations such as the Philippines and China. But not everyone is rejoicing; some quarters say the outsourcing trend is costing hundreds of thousands of jobs in the developed economies. British unions say some 200,000 jobs will be lost to outsourcing overseas. And the US expects more than 3.3 million American jobs to be moved offshore by 2015 -- the bulk of it to India. So it is no surprise that lobbies in the US and trade unions in the UK are protesting against the job drain. "In the case of the Indian call centres, how do you console the Americans losing their jobs to Indians. What do you do about this? The American economy has to adjust and absorb these people back into the economy, if they lose their jobs to Indians, Pakistanis or others," said Stephen Cohen, an expert on South Asia. But there is no stopping the trend in India. "There is going to be growth in call centres and so-called Business Process Supply, because of the simple reason that today the technology and know-how we have developed will certainly render those services much more efficient and economic," said Mahendra K Sanghi, alternate president of the Associated Chambers of Commerce and Industry of India. According to the country's IT monitoring body, the National Association of Software and Service Companies, this sector will be earning US$17 billion a year from outsourced jobs. India is expected to have 6,000 call centres by 2008, compared to 40 in 1999. - CNA channelnewsasia.com