IBM to expand BPO operations in India

Amid the competition against other global outsourcing firms that challenges India, the world's IT major IBM is planning to expand its business process outsourcing operations in the country and plans to increase its workforce here this year.

IBM has decided to boost its BPO operations in India despite the reduction of outsourcing contracts by global firms resulted by the financial crisis.

According to a quoted source by the Economic Times of India, IBM is planning to further concentrate in the services sector by establishing more BPO centers in the country. Selby Mascarenhas, senior advisory consultant of IBM Poland also said that they would hire at least 5,000 people to strengthen its expansion.

Mascarenhas added that the global IT giant is optimistic on the growth prospect of the sector in the domestic economy.

IBM presently has IBM has existing BPO offices in major cities including Kolkata, Mumbai and Hyderabad. The IT firm would prefer to scale up these centers by coming up with new units instead of moving to smaller cities.

Last year, IBM did not open its recruitment in India as because of the challenges in the market, although there was no retrenchment, said the IBM official. She added that there was no need to lay off workers in the country because of the cost effectiveness of the workers, compared to their overseas counterparts.

Mascarenhas also mentioned that the recruitment process already kicked off but in a gradual manner.

IBM India recently won contracts in the domestic markets' services sector such as Sardar Bhiladwala Pardi People's Cooperative Bank in Gujarat, Telecommunications Consultants and Madhav Nagrik Sahakari Cooperative Bank.