PH IT-BPM industry cautiously optimistic for 2026

The IT & Business Process Automation is cautiously optimistic over growth in 2026, with the industry projected to generate $42 billion in export revenues and hit 1.97 million full-time employees despite the ongoing uncertainties.

According to IBPAP president and chief executive officer Jack Madrid, the major growth driver of the industry will be global capability centers (GCCs), as the group earlier reported interest from American and Australian firms to expand in the country.

“Similar to 2025, we continue to see some momentum from the GCC segment of IT-BPM (information technology - business process management)… I see this as a particularly positive growth because the GCCs have been amazingly successful and growing very fast in India,” he told reporters in Makati City.

“They have over 1,800 GCCs there and of course, India is a much bigger country with a bigger population, but we are actually positioned very well to be a very strong second to India in terms of GCC,” he added.

Madrid said healthcare is also a fast-growing sector, with most US companies already in the Philippines, along with banking and financial services.

For 2025, the Philippine IT-BPM sector outpaced global industry growth as it reported a 5% expansion in terms of its export revenue to exceed $40 billion, and a 4% increase in its headcount to hit 1.9 million workers.

“It’s no small feat for the Philippine industry despite a very challenging geopolitical macroeconomic climate in 2025, a couple of things made things a bit more uncertain in terms of investor appetite and confidence in expansion,” Madrid said.

“We will continue to see some of that uncertainty as we begin 2026, but I can say that we are cautiously optimistic about another positive year of growth for the Philippine IT-BPM industry,” he added.

Madrid cited challenges in the ease of doing business in the country relating to incentives, the processing of business permits from the local government units (LGUs), the reliability of infrastructure, power supply, and connectivity.

“If we don’t meet the expectations of our investors justifying the decision to establish operations in the Philippines, then that would be a challenge,” he said.

He also noted the availability of employable talent and the upskilling of the existing workforce, with the industry estimated to invest some P1.4 billion on talent annually.

“Any support from the government, of course, will be very much welcome because that will help optimize total costs. We have to remember it’s no longer just India and the Philippines,” Madrid said.

“In the past decade, new IT-BPM, BPO destinations have emerged and they are aiming to capture some of the market share of the Philippines,” he added.

Among the emerging destinations Madrid cited are Egypt, Poland, South Africa, Vietnam, Malaysia, Colombia, and South America.

“It should be our collective objective to protect and retain that market share. We will not be number one, but it doesn’t matter… What matters is capability and our ability to solve our global customers’ problems in a satisfactory manner,” Madrid said.—AOL, GMA Integrated News