Archive for December 7th, 2008
Local BPO industry feels heat of global financial crisis
By Jesus F. Llanto
Researcher, Newsbreak
December 3, 2008
The global economic crisis is slowing down the demand for services in some sectors of the business process outsourcing (BPO) industry and experts are saying they may revise growth targets for 2010.
At the ongoing 2-day BPO Summit Philippines 2008 in Ortigas business district, industry leaders from the various sectors of the BPO industry said that the slowdown in the United States—where major BPO clients are located—and in other major economies have slowed down their operations.
Industry leaders from the non-voice sectors of the BPO industry like animation and transcription said that the financial crisis has been affected by decreasing demand from the United States.
Grace Dimaranan, president of the Animation Council of the Philippines, said some of the projects they have were on hold due to the recession. “Some animation series where reduced.”
The animation sector has been growing by an average of 38 percent during the past three years, data from the Business Process Association of the Philippines (BPAP) showed. In 2007, it generated a revenue of US$105 million or 2 percent of the US13 billion generated by the entire BPO industry in 2007.
Meanwhile, Myla Reyes, managing director of the Medical Transcription Industry Association of the Philippines (MTIAPI) said that some of their operations slowed down as a result of the economic meltdown.
The transcription sector generated US$197 million or 4 percent of the total BPO revenues. For the past three years, the sector is growing at an average of 24 percent.
Medical transcription industry to take a hit from US recession
By Jesus F. Llanto
Researcher, Newsbreak
December 2, 2008
The Philippine medical transcription industry will not be spared from the effects of the global economic slowdown although its share in the global market is small, an executive of a transcription company said Tuesday.
Speaking in one of the sessions at the BPO Summit Philippines 2008, Fred Kumetz, chief executive officer of medical and transcription firm eData Services said that the medical transcription (MT) sector is not immune to the effects of the slowdown in the economy of the United States, where most MT clients are based,
“The belief that medical transcription is recession proof is a fallacy,” said Kumetz.
Kumetz, however, said that the effect of the slowdown in the global MT industry will be “totally insignificant” because the Philippine MT industry is too small to be affected by the financial crisis.
The transcription sector is one of the non-voice sectors of the BPO in the Philippines. In 2007, the sector generated US$197 million and it has grown by an average of 24 percent during the past three years.
