Ron Somers, president, United States-India Business Council speaks his mind about Indo-US tiff over outsourcing.
Thomas Mathew went to the Travisa Outsourcing Center in New York expecting the same treatment as he had received at the consulate earlier. "But things have changed. There was no long queue especially outside of the building. Services were prompt and employees were more helpful," he said.
The Indian High Commission in the UK will outsource the visa application process from Thursday, bringing relief to nearly half a million Britons visiting the country every year who can now say good bye to long queues.
The human resource business process outsourcing revenue will reach $46 billion in 2003, an 18 per cent increase over $39 billion in the previous year, according to a Gartner report.
Aided by low labour costs, China has overtaken India as the primary destination of outsourcing and shared services for Asia-Pacific companies -- netting business to the tune of $20 billion, according to accounting firm KPMG.
Meanwhile, the country's apex body Finance Sector Union demanded the federal government to review all bank licensing arrangements to ensure back office jobs stay in Australia. The union's call follows a report that Westpac -- which on Thursday announced a 34.2 per cent jump profit for the six months to March 31 to $2.202 billion -- is expected to shift the work of up to 3,000 of its back-room staff to overseas locations such as India during the next three years.
The unions are planning a major protest in Birmingham on July 27, at National Grid's annual general meeting. National Grid is a leading supplier of gas and electricity in Britain and the northeast region of the US. In an e-mail response to queries from Business Standard, a NG spokesperson said the company already outsources some information services support from India, from companies including Tata Consultancy Services, Wipro and Zensar Technologies.
The contract, which involves upgrade of LIC's front-end IT application programmes to make these accessible through the web, is said to be worth about Rs 200 crore, and will be done over five years. It is understood that most large Indian IT outsourcing companies, including TCS, Infosys and L&T Infotech, had competed for the contract. It was considered prestigious, not because of its size but because it involved a prestigious public sector organisation like LIC.
On a week's visit to India to plan for business in 2009 and also to attend the wedding of India chairman Arvind Sharma's daughter, Tom Bernardin, chairman and chief executive officer, Leo Burnett Worldwide, announced changes in its global leadership council for a tighter integration of Asia Pacific with the Chicago headquarters.
World Bank President James Wolfensohn has said that outsourcing was a natural consequence of the free market and suggested safety nets be put in place to protect those who lose their jobs.
If Obama makes it difficult for U.S. companies to send jobs overseas or hire using H-1B visas, India's huge IT sector could suffer
The Delhi high court has ruled that outsourcing units cannot be clubbed with each other or the company outsourcing work to them for the purpose of Employees Provident Fund.
The strike has been on for four days at the Nashik centre of the business process outsourcing company, which has a headcount of 23,874.
Joseph Crowley, a visiting US Congressman, has said a New Jersey bill that seeks to ban outsourcing of technical jobs to non-US entities is an unhealthy legislation and such laws will not find favour with other American states.
British students are using Indian expertise in information technology to complete their course assignments by posting them on outsourcing websites and buying the completed coursework.Called 'contract cheating' in academic circles, lecturers in computing department in universities are in a tizzy since such coursework is of high quality and difficult to detect through normal plagiarism detection software.The students pay amounts ranging from 5 to 50 pounds for the complete work
Move to ensure deals do not hit govt licence fees, revenue share.
The 13th Finance Commission has outsourced a major part of the exercise for devising ways to better manage ecology, environment in the North-East to two prominent organisations. The commission has entrusted two renowned institutes of the country -- The Energy and Resources Institute and the Bhopal-based Indian Institute of Forest Management -- with the job to explore ways to better manage ecology, environment and climate change consistent with sustainable development.
"Over the last few decades, revolutions in technology and communication have made it so that corporations can send good jobs wherever there's an Internet connection. Children here in Missouri aren't just growing up competing for good jobs with children in California or Indiana, but with children in China and India as well," Senator Obama said at a campaign rally in Springfield, Missouri.
Political opposition in the US to outsourcing has had many IT service providers in India on tenterhooks for the last three years fearing a policy level decision against it.
Outsourcing IT processes overseas may save money, but...
The Reliance Anil Dhirubhai Ambani Group has awarded a 5-year outsourcing contract to a Delhi-based call centre, Caretel Infotech, a part of Dalmiya group, for about Rs 300 crore.
Riding over lower manufacturing cost coupled with availability of quality manpower with technical capabilities, the Indian pharmaceutical outsourcing industry is expected to reach $2.3 billion by the end of 2010, according to a report.
Alarmed by a report that 1.7 million US jobs may be lost to other countries, particularly to India, American workers, trade unions, local governments and legislators are fighting back to keep jobs at home and prevent outsourcing.
Independent research firm Forrester Research has in its latest tech market report titled 'US IT Market Outlook: Q4 2008' revised its 2009 US IT spending forecast.
The government should allow private airlines to outsource services like security, ground-handling and engineering to enable them become cost effective, Go Air managing director Jeh Wadia said in Mumbai on Thursday.
Indian CEOs are to be now offered the choice of outsourcing all or part of their managerial responsibilities for a specified period.
Moser Baer found that its outsourcing deal with a US company was the source behind its ascent by 1.8% to Rs 242.90 on BSE in early trades on Wednesday.
'GenAI has democratised the AI conversation. I do not know of a single client who is not interested in that conversation.'
This is the third instance when outsourcing of key oversight jobs by global banks to India has come under the regulatory scanner abroad for ineffective controls against suspicious financial transactions.
'We will have a strong exit as our third quarter is strong.'
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