Philippines 2010: Facing the Inevitable KPO Growth Through Creative E-Services
The last ten years have proven to be fruitful in the Philippine business process outsourcing (BPO) industry, which is now evolving to accommodate more specialized outsourced solutions more commonly known as knowledge process outsourcing or KPO. While India still finds itself in the forefront of the global outsourcing industry, the Philippines has quite a lot of accomplishments to boast of as well. Garnering the honors of being one of the world’s best outsourcing destinations as recognized by our U.K. partners and clients, the Philippines has captured a fair share of the global BPO industry and managed to grow its 2009 revenue by 19%. In fact, the KPO industry generated as much as $1.19 billion, a 35% increase from its 2008 revenues. This year, the country is expected to further expand its outsourcing industry to accommodate KPO and various services under it.
Since the 1970s, the Philippine animation industry has come a long way to provide a wide array of creative services that include animation for television and graphic design for print. With the country catering to a wide array of clients from all over the world, the Animation Council of the Philippines, Inc. (ACPI) fully supported the 10th e-Services Global Sourcing Conference and Exhibition, a government-led ICT/BPO trade event aiming to feature the country’s blooming creative process outsourcing industry, an arm of the country’s knowledge process outsourcing (KPO) industry.
The e-Services Global Sourcing Conference and Exhibition is a yearly event where the nation’s best BPO and KPO service providers gather in one venue organized by the center for International Trade Expositions (CITEM), Department of Trade and Industry (DTI), Board of Investments (BOI), the Foreign Trade Service Corps (FTSC), the Regional Operations and Development Group (RODG), and the Commission on Information and Communications Technology (CICT).
While the Philippines has long been seen to be one of the world’s best destinations for voice-based BPO, ACPI is pushing for the country to be recognized as a world leader in creative process outsourcing (CPO) and knowledge process outsourcing (KPO), with the Filipinos’ natural talent in several disciplines of design. Moreover, the diversity of the world market now puts several creative industries under the wings of CPO and KPO. Today, the CPO/KPO industry reach has gone to include animation and game development industries, music and sound engineering, advertising, film, industrial design, architecture, comics, photography, publishing, writing and conceptualization.
Today’s Philippine KPO industry in the Philippines is backed by creative units, whose core competencies include consistent quality and output delivery speed, English proficiency and excellent ability to comprehend concepts and storylines. Animation is just one of the many sectors that are currently being highlighted for e-services clients coming to the Philippines to tap creative KPO talents. In 2009, the creative KPO industry in the Philippines comprised of 5,000 local animators garnered as much as $110 worth of revenues.
ACPI President Weng Bagadion sees this as a milestone for the nation’s growth and potential to be a leader in the global creative process outsourcing industry, citing that “the Filipino industry has matured to a point where we are now seeking for self-actualization” and that we should further develop “our own brand of animation.” It is a definitive feat for the Filipino to succeed in the knowledge process outsourcing (KPO) after years of exponential growth in the BPO sector.
ACPI is a 55-member non-profit organization that specializes in full 2D and 3D animation as well as pre- and post-production services that include lay outing, web design, and mobile applications, and is working with the Technical Education and Skills Development Authority (TESDA) to provide e-learning modules, training regulations, and assessment tools for schools offering animation training.
For clients looking to outsource processes that require a higher level of skills and expertise, the Philippines is one of the top destinations for KPO, as reported by Datamonitor, an independent market analysis firm that released a report titled “Trends in Knowledge Process Outsourcing – Growth Opportunities in High-Level Processes”. KPO is seen as the “next stage in the evolution of the outsourcing market” and the Philippine outsourcing community comprised of BPO and KPO service providers is already on their feet to stay competitive in the years to come.