There has been lots of conflicting news about the outsourcing world this week that has got the Round-Up’s head in a spin. It has been reported that India’s strong hold over the outsourcing domain is set to waver. Apparently, there are not enough skilled individuals to take up the bounteous employment opportunities that have resulted from the Indian outsourcing boom. The answer? To send the European workers whose jobs had been outsourced over to India to take up their previously owned job positions on foreign soil? With current UK job prospects it might not be a bad idea.
However, Gartner has also published a report spouting praise about India’s position within the outsourcing market. Apparently the old outsourcing giant is looking good for 2009. What to believe? You decide…
On a less perplexing note, the news on sourcingfocus.com has been all good in respect to EDS. The company has signed an ITO contract with The California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation. The contract is a 4.5 year engagement, designed to transform the agency’s ‘digital environment’.
It is hoped that the affiliation will help to improve productivity, accuracy and ultimately, enhance staff, public and offender safety.
Additionally, EDS will create and manage the image capture, database, information storage and server environment where offender information will reside.
EDS has not stopped there this week. Continental Airlines has also them up to transform its Flight Planning Services. The contracts aim it to reduce flight operating expenses and create efficiencies for Continental by automating some aspects of flight planning.
EDS Flight Planning is the fourth component in EDS’ flight operations suite being implemented at Continental. EDS is also currently developing EDS Air-to-Ground Messaging Services, EDS Load Planning Services and EDS Aircraft Movement Services for Continental. What a lot of branding. Before you ask, no, I don’t work for EDS’s PR team.
That’s enough on EDS for this week. Now on to more general news in regards to outsourcing. To be more precise, knowledge process outsourcing (KPO). According to a new Datamonitor report the KPO market represents a significant growth opportunity for vendors.
Ed Thomas, is the analyst for business process outsourcing (BPO) at Datamonitor and author of the report. He points out that, throughout the evolution of the KPO market, one feature that has remained constant is the leveraging of offshore delivery models. “India has been the focal point for the KPO industry since its inception. Increasingly, however, KPO vendors are adopting a multi-shoring approach to service delivery.”
Datamonitor has identified eight key locations that have emerged in recent years as viable options for KPO service delivery, including China, the Philippines, Sri Lanka, Hungary, the Czech Republic, Canada, Mexico and Brazil. The report assesses the strengths and weaknesses of these geographies and looks at how they can form part of a vendor’s multi-shore delivery model.
But what’s this? More conflicting evidence?
On another contrary note, PA Consulting expound the dangers of multisourcing. In a report this week, featured in our news analysis, the consultants found that outsourcers simply don’t understand what they are getting themselves into with multisourcing.
Who’s saying what? Who’s right? Who’s wrong? Who knows? What a confusing week. Now where did I outsource those employees?
