SPi Global expects to sustain revenue growth this year

MANILA, Philippines - Telecoms leader PLDT is expecting sustained revenue growth from its business process outsourcing (BPO) unit, SPi Global, based on its improving marketing efforts and given the bright prospects for the BPO industry in the country.

SPi Global reported service revenues of P2.4 billion in the first quarter of 2012, an increase of 20 percent compared with the same period last year. This accounts for five percent of the total consolidated revenues of the PLDT group.

“The prospects for our BPO business continue to improve buoyed by the double-digit growth forecast for the outsourcing industry,” said PLDT president and CEO Napoleon Nazareno.

The Knowledge Processing Solutions (KPS) unit of SPi Global registered a 22 percent increase in service revenues to P1.6 billion in the first quarter as a result of the full integration in the content solutions business of India-based publishing BPO Laserwords which was acquired late last year and an 11 percent increase from its content solutions services.

The revenues from Customer Relationship Management (CRM) services, meanwhile, rose 16 percent to P0.8 billion, with domestic sales registering 10 percent growth.

“This potential, coupled with a focused approach of generating sales, managing costs, and delivering world class quality services, should ensure the growing contribution of our BPO business to overall PLDT performance,” Nazareno pointed out.

 SPi Global recently signed up new clients for both CRM and KPS businesses, including the expansion of existing contracts. It has also fully integrated Laserwords with its content solutions business.

“We also see continued margin growth as SPi Global leverages fixed costs and infrastructure over a higher revenue base that increases seat share ratio over stable operating expenses,” said SPi Global president and CEO Maulik Parekh. He added that a strong sales pipeline is also developing for 2013.

SPi’s prospects is in step with that of the whole BPO industry. According to Vice President Jejomar Binay during the recent Asian Development Bank Annual Meeting in Manila, the BPO industry is the fastest growing sector in the country, making the Philippines the No. 1 in voice and No. 2 in non-voice services in the world.

The bright industry outlook prompted the Department of Science and Technology to revise its revenue target from the BPO industry to $27.4 billion from $25 billion in 2016.

In 2011, the PLDT Group consolidated its BPO operations, consisting of CRM and KPS under SPi Global. KPS and CRM had previously been under ePLDT, along with other ICT businesses such as data center operations, which have since been transferred to the fixed line business.

SPi Global offers a wide range of voice and non-voice BPO solutions and provides domain expertise in the customer interaction, healthcare, and publishing markets, making it the largest Filipino-owned BPO company.

SPi Global has been named “BPO Company of the Year” in the 2011 International ICT Awards. It has also bested other foreign BPO companies in Vietnam to win The Sao Khue 2012 Prize for the best BPO service in the BPO services category.

 The company has also ranked among the top 100 outsourcing service providers in the world by the International Association of Outsourcing Professionals’ (IAOP) Global Outsourcing 100 list and the Global Services Media’s Global Services 100 List.