IT firm branches out into call center ops

Publicly-listed Island Information & Technology Inc. (IITI) has branched out into contact center operations after forging an alliance with a US-based technology company to set up a P120-million joint venture in the Philippines.

IITI president Andres Lao Sr. told the Philippine Stock Exchange that the company has signed a partnership with US Asia Solutions Inc. to put up an outbound call center with IITI controlling 80 percent of the equity structure and US Asia managing the operations.

He said for the joint venture, IITI will commit to invest up to P300 million within the next three years.

US Asia Solutions and its associate companies and management have been in the call center industry within the US, Canada, UK, Europe and Asia since 1962. Like many companies, it has gone through several corporate transformations, starting from a foreign investment and communications company to a telecommunications firm focused on the call center industry.

Today, it furnishes call center management expertise to more than 20 call centers within the US, Canada, Europe and Asia, with it owning, operating or managing these different centers. "The clients provided by US Asia Solutions are large US companies with the majority of them being New York Stock Exchange corporations," Lao said.

Among these clients are Cendant, the owner of the Avis Rental Car, real estate broker Century 21 and Ramada; Carlsonn, the owner of Radissons, TGIF Fridays and Italianna’s; Bluegreen; Hilton; and Sunterra.

IITI, on the other hand, was incorporated in December 1959 as Island Oil Co. to primarily engage in oil exploration and mineral development projects. However, due to incurred losses, the management decided to shift its oil exploration activities to metal mining in the province of Isabela in the hope that it could recover previous losses, thus changing its name from Island Oil to Island Mining & Industrial Corp. in January 1965.

But as its mining business similarly suffered from the industry’s downturn, the company again changed its name to IITI on May 2000, changing its primary purpose from that of a mining concern to that of an intensive Internet technology and telecommunication company. – Conrado Diaz Jr.