Solartis, a provider of insurance policy administration software and services, has announced the expansion of services to now include Business Process Outsourcing targeted to insurance companies and their distribution partners. The Solartis BPO Services are created to focus on behind-the-scenes processing activities like data entry and clearance, quote and proposal development, rating and policy data entry and assembly, electronic filing and document distribution.

Customers can experience such benefits as more time for underwriting and customer service, improved turn-around time and a minimum of a 33 percent reduction in administrative costs. With this cut in the cost of necessary activities, insurance providers can focus more on driving profits and ultimately delivering a better value to the end customer.

“Expanding into Insurance BPO was a natural extension of our automation and consulting work. BPO reduces ongoing administrative costs without changing technology platforms or modifying business processes,” said Solartis President Nick Richardson (News - Alert), in a statement. (more…)

Software exporter L&T Infotech, which has been lagging its larger rivals in growth rates and profitability, wants to add BPO capability  to its portfolio of offerings so it can provide customers with the full range of services starting from application development and testing to back-office processing. The company has appointed one of the big four consulting firms to advise on its BPO strategy. L&T Infotech is a fully-owned subsidiary of engineering giant Larsen & Toubro.

“We want to be able to offer to the full range of services. We already have infrastructure management, independent testing services and application development and maintenance,” said Sudip Banerjee, CEO of L&T Infotech. The consulting firm is expected to submit its report on what sectors and services L&T Infotech should focus on for BPO as well as advise it on suitable delivery locations. In addition, it will also advise the firm on whether acquisitions can be an entry strategy into BPO services.

Wipro and IBM have used their acquisitions of Spectramind and Daksh BPO Services respectively to successfully enter the BPO business in the past. However, Mr Banerjee, a former Wipro executive, said such a strategy, involving the acquisition of diversified third-party BPO provider, was unfit for the current environment when BPO was already a mature industry segment . He said the company was open to niche acquisitions such as captive back-office units of mutlinationals for building its BPO business. (more…)

IT and BPO service provider, Hexaware Technologies, today said its consolidated net profit jumped twofold to Rs 36.03 crore for the fourth quarter ended December 31, 2009, over the same period last year.
 
As per the Indian accounting standards, income declined to Rs 252 crore for the quarter ended December 31, from Rs 305.85 crore in the same period corresponding year, Hexaware Technologies said in a filing to the Bombay Stock Exchange.

On the standalone basis, the company has posted a net profit of Rs 28.73 crore, a jump of over fourfold over the same period last year.

Further, the company has appointed President and Global Delivery Head, R V Ramanan as the manager of the company with effect from January 1 for a period of three years. Source

The business process outsourcing sector (BPO) expects sales to grow by a quarter to $9 billion this year as the industry rides the wave of a general economic recovery. The industry’s revenues of $7.2 billion last year — a 19-percent increase — came in at the lower end of its target of $7.2-$7.4 billion due to the caution that prevailed among businesses in the first half, the Business Processing Association of the Philippines (BPA/P) said on Monday. In 2008, sales went up by 24 percent.

Meanwhile, the head of the Commission on Information and Communication Technology (CICT), said the industry should prepare for an expected pickup in business this year. “What we need to do is to maintain our supply of talent and focus on infrastructure. We expect the BPO industry to grow more as our markets emerge from the recession,” CICT chief Ray Anthony Roxas Chua III told reporters on the sidelines of an industry conference. “We also expect voice[-based] outsourcing to continue to grow, but also see faster growth in nonvoice outsourcing, which is gaining ground,” he added, citing the need to build competitiveness as more countries enter the global outsourcing market. The Philippines is estimated to have a 15 percent market share, according to Everest Research Institute. (more…)

Genpact, the country’s largest pure-play BPO company, today acquired Bangalore-based analytics and data management services provider Symphony Marketing Solutions (SMS). Though the deal size was not disclosed, analysts peg the deal to be around Rs 450-500 crore and the SMS’ revenue to be around Rs 300 crore.

“This expertise will allow us to offer a broader range of services, ranging from core finance and accounting, procurement and supply chain to data management and advanced analytics solutions,” said Pramod Bhasin, president and CEO, Genpact. Employing over 1,200 staffers worldwide, SMS offers analytics services to retail, pharmaceutical and consumer packaged goods verticals.

“Coming as it is in times when Genpact’s business is under pressure, both from volumes as well as a margins perspective, this acquisition is driven with a motivation of having a larger pie of burgeoning analytics services which offers both above average growth and margins. While this acquisition will have a comparatively marginal impact on revenue growth, the impact on margins will be materially significant,” said Alok Shende, Founder and Principal Analyst, Ascentius Consulting. (more…)

Amid signs of fast recovery from the impact of global economic slowdown, the information technology and business process outsourcing (BPO) industry would see its exports reach $50 billion in the current financial year, registering a growth of over 5 per cent. Similarly, export revenues are likely to grow at 13-15 per cent next fiscal to cross $57 billion, with the US remaining the dominant market.

In its yearly performance report, the National Association of Software and Service Companies (Nasscom) has said the domestic IT-BPO market is likely to reach Rs.66,200 crore, clocking a growth of 12 per cent, while in the next fiscal domestic revenues are likely to grow by 15-17 per cent to touch Rs.76,100-77,500 crore, particularly due to government IT spending. (more…)

The talks are being held between financial investors at Genpact and Blackstone, which holds a little under 80% in Intelenet, one of the persons who spoke with ET on condition of anonymity, added. Genpact is the country’s largest BPO firm and has investments from private equity player General Atlantic and other investors, which hold nearly half of the firm. Intelenet is the country’s 14th-largest BPO firm.

The acquisition is of interest to Genpact because of the ability to derisk its revenues, which are still significantly dependent on its one-time parent, General Electric (GE), and consequently improve valuations, the person said. GE contributes around 40% of Genpact’s revenues. “Intelenet’s India business is the chief attraction to Genpact, but Blackstone is not willing to sell that alone,” the second person told ET. He said the potential transaction value could be $600-750 million. (more…)

India’s largest information technology services provider, Tata Consultancy Services (TCS), beat market expectations with its third quarter (October-December 2009) results. The growth drivers were North America and BFSI (banking financial services and insurance), signalling a recovery in the sector. N Chandrasekaran, Chief Executive Officer and Managing Director, believes growth will get better, but one should not expect a similar volume growth (especially in BFSI) in January-March 2010 (fourth quarter). In a chat with Shivani Shinde, he spoke on clients, growth prospects and the company’s hiring plans. Edited excerpts:
 
What do you attribute your good numbers to?
We did not score merely on the selling general and administrative (SG&A) front by cutting costs. Our gross margins have been improving, too, and they have now become a benchmark. This means we have delivered to customers in all our markets. Our utilisation, too, improved 81.1 per cent (excluding trainees) and including trainees, it was 77.2 per cent. On the net profit side, we did not have much hedging losses. We will incur hedging losses in Q4 due to currency fluctuations but I am hoping the situation will improve thereafter. (more…)

PIRON Consulting has acquired fifty percent stake in REAL TIME BPO and it will now be called ‘PIRON REAL TIME BPO’. This stake has been acquired to strategically place PIRON for catering to the IFRS outsourcing requirements. As corporate India prepares itself for transition to International Financial Reporting Standards (IFRS), PIRON consultancy realized the need for preparedness for IFRS expertise demand and takes this holistic approach to meet the requirements.

“As major part of world is moving towards IFRS, hence PIRON is sensing great outsourcing opportunity in IFRS accounting and compliance related outsourcing work from these countries. PIRON would be doing all its Europe outsourcing work on IFRS through this BPO. There is a scarcity of IFRS experts in US also, so outsourcing would be the key which would in turn benefit Indian IFRS Professionals”, explained Ankur Aggarwal, CEO, PIRON Consulting. (more…)

Aegis, the BPO arm of the Essar group, is close to acquiring 10 acres of prime land from the Buddhadeb government to set up an integrated  campus in Kolkata for an undisclosed sum. Aegis is looking to double capacity at its present 3,000-strong team of ITeS professionals in the city’s Salt Lake Electronics Complex (Saltlec).

At present, Aegis operates out of a 1 lakh sq ft facility in Salt Lake Sector V. Moves are afoot to develop an integrated campus near its existing unit over the next 12-18 months. Once the campus is up and running, Aegis teams in Kolkata will primarily handle outsourcing work in the telecoms, BFSI and healthcare verticals.

When contacted, Aegis MD & global CEO Aparup Sengupta told ET: “We’ve recently given a letter of intent to the West Bengal IT department seeking 10 acres near our existing Salt Lake facility. The plan is to double our capacity and headcount in Kolkata from the present 3,000 to at least 6,000 ITeS professionals in the next 12-18 months.”

Mr Sengupta, however, declined to reveal the price. “Price negotiations are on with the West Bengal government. We propose to implement this expansion model in places like Bhopal and Jamshedpur,” he said. Source