NASSCOM urges stronger India-RP outsourcing ties
First posted 00:43am (Mla time) June 25, 2005
By Alexander Villafania
INQ7.net

CEBU CITY -- Instead of competing, top executive of India's National Association of Software and Services Companies (NASSCOM) called for stronger collaboration between India and the Philippines to maintain a healthy offshoring industry between them.

NASSCOM’s Kiran Karnic, speaking via videophone during the Cebu ICT 2005 Conference, said the Philippines has been identified even by Indian firms as a potential partner in the massive IT offshore outsource business, mainly due to its large English-speaking population and effective use of information technology.

Karnik said there are several collaborative areas for the Philippines and India to work on – like identifying new markets apart from traditional business process outsourcing industries, establishing disaster recovery operations to ensure business continuity, and outlining policies to lessen barriers for the operation of BPO firms that both governments can work on with their countries’ business associations.

In agreement, Joaquin Quintos, general manager of IBM Philippines, said during the panel discussion that a synergistic collaboration between India and the Philippines would indeed have a better effect on both their economies. There should be a sharing of more workload and best practices among BPO operators in both countries, Quintos said

Kiran added that data and network security should be a primary objective of both BPO firms and the Indian and Philippine governments, particularly with recent news of network attacks against companies with high-level content.

Likewise, SPI Technologies President Ernest Cu noted that failure in data and network security in an Indian or Filipino BPO operator could invite American anti-outsourcing legislators to denounce outsourcing anew.

“Both countries should also build human resource so that we can serve higher BPO services that would strengthen relations with customers,” Kiran added.

Surprisingly, Kiran said one advantage the Philippines could improve is its Spanish language proficiency, which he said India has very little of.

“One of the biggest markets for outsourcing happens to have a major requirement for Spanish-speaking contact center operators,” Kiran said referring to the US, which has a large Hispanic population.

Kiran's statement on Spanish proficiency drew muffled laughter among Filipino delegates of the conference. The Philippines was once a colony of Spain and Spanish was still being taught in schools years ago.

Despite having positive notes for the Philippines, Kiran also made it known that its government, private companies and even media should avoid protectionism, which he said is detrimental to collaboration between the two countries.

“We're concerned about this and both India and the Philippines should have ways to handle this situation,” Kiran said.

Reprinted with permission from INQ7.net, Infotech Section.