Cebu, Manila eyed as major hubs for BPO in the future

An official of the Cebu Investment Promotion Center (CIPC) suggested that the next major hubs for the business process outsourcing will only be Manila and Cebu.

Joel Mari Yu, managing director of CIPC said that Cebu produces an average of 23,000 graduates every year but it also banks of other college graduates from reputable schools in the Visayas and Mindanao areas which also make up another set of good talent pool, Yu added.

Cebu according to Yu is truly ready for the BPO. It has no problem with the infrastructure that BPO companies can lease. There are already a number of buildings that have been put up to address this need. The Asia-town IT park has been developed to cater to the BPO sector.

To date, Cebu has 25 call centers and more than 70 BPO companies that offer software and animation services; medical transcription and legal services among others. Yu said that the BPO industry here directly employs 40,000 to 50,000 workers.

These do not include the employment from coffee shops, restaurants, bakeshops, novelty and convenience stores that are earning because of the BPO industry, Yu said.

"The BPO in Cebu is definitely not a fad. It will continue to grow and flourish because it has already the infrastructure, talented manpower and an effective public-private partnership that creates conducive business environment," Yu said.

According to Yu, the CIPC receives inquiries from international companies as to where they can put up their centers in Cebu. "Just lately, an Indian company asked us to help them coordinate their plans of putting up a BPO center in Cebu with 1,000 to 1,500 seat capacity," Yu concluded. (PIA-Cebu)