MANILA, Philippines — Business process outsourcing (BPO) companies clinched $40 million worth of deals at the two-day e-Services Global Sourcing Conference held in Pasay City, the event organizer Center for International Trade Expositions and Missions (CITEM) said.

This year’s e-Services hosted a record number of local and foreign buyers in attendance, including 140 exhibitors, the state-run CITEM said.

The current realty and construction boom has increased outsourcing demand for designers, it added.

New partnerships formed at e-Services included one between a Swedish company and five Philippine BPO firms on establishing an offshore IT vendor business, CITEM said.

A corporate research company in the United Kingdom is planning to expand its BPO services in the Philippines, it also said.

There were also about 60 business meetings arranged between Philippine companies and foreign delegates from Japan, the United Kingdom and Sweden, it added.

The conference paved the way for industry players to move on with their Roadmap 2010, which identifies aggressive talent development as the most important factor for growth, followed by the need to establish a first-rate business environment, and the promotion of the “next-wave cities” for BPO operations.

Oscar Sañez of the Business Processing Association of the Philippines said that if the three areas were addressed, the industry stood to grow 40 percent annually through 2010.

Source: Philippine Daily Inquirer