“We see a great opportunity for our services in the Indian market”

Front-end business process outsourcing (BPO) has a new player on the block. The US-based Utopia Inc. plans to offer value-based BPO services with a difference to global clients and is looking for Indian partners to provide end-to-end solutions to its customers. Arvind J Singh, president & CEO, Utopia Inc. shares his views on India and the BPO space with Gaurav Patra

What are Utopia’s major strengths?
We set up Utopia with a view to sell services to clients and help them manage their businesses in an efficient and cost-effective manner by outsourcing jobs. We want to act as a bridge between corporate houses and call centre/BPO companies. We are in the business of identifying customer needs and then delivering a product to match that need.

Two main focus areas for us are customer relationship management and back office processes. We have three distinct advantages—extensive experience and a proven track record, expertise in building brands and managing customer relationships and our worldwide presence. We also have first hand knowledge of the outsourcing business, which is an added advantage for us. To survive in the BPO space, domain knowledge is very critical and we have expertise in a range of domains like IT, financial services, consumer goods, ERP and CRM, consulting, insurance, telecom and retail. Our vision is to be the leader in process solutions that enable organisations to seamlessly manage workflow across geographic boundaries.

How are Indian BPO companies different from other companies across the globe?
There are quite a few advantages of Indian BPO companies. In terms of skill sets, the Indian workforce is by nature highly skilled. So, the nature of professional services that one can offer under BPO in India is significantly better. Another critical factor is scalability. Take the Philippines, for instance. That country currently has only about 10,000 people working in the BPO/call centre space. India has around ten times that number today, and it can reach 20-30 times in the future. This is because India’s pool of graduates and educated people is much larger. So, for an Indian company to scale up is significantly easier than a Filipino company or for that matter an Irish or a Canadian company. And as far as the ability to manage complex tasks is concerned, India has a definite advantage over other countries. These three parameters put India in a very strong position. Basically, India’s vast pool of English-speaking and cheaper manpower, the educational system and training programmes have helped transform the country into a global outsourcing superpower in the last few years. And apart from this, low cost and high quality of services provided by Indian companies are also major differentiators.

What strategies would help BPO companies move up the value chain?
Software companies or IT projects-related companies are now moving into the BPO space. And all these companies typically target CIOs. However, the BPO business is actually a high-end business, which involves processes of a company that are critical. So, typically CEOs or CFOs or the marketing heads take decisions regarding BPO, and not the CIOs. To move up the value chain target the business heads or CEOs. And this is where Utopia fits in, because we come from a business background and we have contacts with the business heads of different companies. Apart from this, one also needs to have domain knowledge, which is very critical.

What is going to be your strategy for the Indian market?
We see a great opportunity for our services in the Indian market. We are setting up an office in Chennai, which will be initially managed by a small team of technical and management staff. The office strength would be scaled up in a phased manner. We are here to finalise agreements with BPO companies to help US-based companies farm out their back-office operations in India and cut costs. We have also decided to transfer the back-office operations of our clients to India to take advantage of cost competitiveness. Apart from this we are also planning to sign agreements with at least three or four high quality call centres in India to service our clients in the US. We also intend to be in every major city in the US as well as every major call centre hub in India.