Philippine IT-BPO industry hits 2011 growth targets

The Philippine Information Technology and Business Process Outsourcing (IT-BPO) industry grew in terms of revenues and employment in 2011, the Business Processing Association of the Philippines (BPAP) said Wednesday.   The industry ended 2011 with $11 billion in revenues, 24 percent more than in 2010.   According to Benedict Hernandez, BPAP president and chief executive, 638,000 people were employed in the IT-BP industry last year, 22 percent more than in 2010.   “We hit the targets projected in our Road Map 2016. This is a good start to our five-year plan to grow at an average of 20 percent a year–above projected global annual growth rates of 10 percent to 15 percent," he said.   If this continues at a compound annual growth rate of 20 percent, the IT-BP industry would be worth $25 billion by 2016, accounting for about 9 percent of GDP and capturing 10 percent of the global IT-BP market share, Hernandez noted.   The contact center sector also grew, strengthening the country’s world No. 1 status in contact centers, he added.   He cited a report by the Contact Center Association of the Philippines that said the sector had 416,000 employees and provided $7.4 billion worth of services by the end of 2011.   According to Hernandez, the contact center sector grew by 21 percent and remained the largest sector at 65 percent of the industry.   Meanwhile, the Healthcare Information Management Outsourcing (HIMO) Association of the Philippines reported that the HIMO sector employed 24,700 and provided as much as $277 million worth of services to global-end users.   The animation sector, however, shrank to $128 million, down 10 percent year-on-year. According to the Animation Council of the Philippines Inc. (ACPI), it lost some contracts due to tight competition in back-room animation services, particularly from China, which subsidizes animation operations.   Despite this, the sector maintained its headcount of about 8,600 animators.   Hernandez said reaching the industry’s 2016 targets “would not be possible without the strong government support that we are now experiencing.”   The government through TESDA (Technical Education and Skills Development Authority) already provided the industry with training subsidies worth P450 million. —Amanda Lago/VS, GMA News