The country’s outsourcing industry seems to be in the pink of health with its growth being fuelled by various areas, one of which is human resources (HR). A United Kingdom-based company, in fact, has decided to expand its global delivery center and Asia Pacific headquarters in Manila.

NorthgateArinso, an HR solutions company with main offices in the UK, bared in a recent briefing that it has opened a new BPO center in Ortigas, Pasig City that currently employs 235 people who are offering full human resource servicing and back-office operations.

Mike Ettling, CEO of NorthgateArinso, told reporters that his company has poured about P25 million in investments on the facility, which has enough capacity to double the current operations in the country by the end of 2010.

In five years, Ettling said the employee headcount could scale up to 1,500 to 2,000.

“Our Philippine operations have been a successful venture for us,” said Ettling, acknowledging that the “service culture” of the country was a major factor for its success.
Unknown to many, the company has been in the country for ten years now.

Company executives said the Philippines serves as its primary center for HR voice processing, which they stressed is a complex service.

“This service is not something you deliver in factory style; it has to be in a very personal manner. And the Philippines has done a tremendous job doing that,” they said.

NorthgateArinso’s global service delivery network consists of nine global and regional delivery centers around the world, which help to deliver HR service in over 70 geographies and 25 languages.

The Manila center provides near-shore services to all Asia Pacific-based customers, and is a key offshore location for North America and Europe. Among the clients that it services through its Manila site are Unilever, Cadbury, Chinabank, and the Bureau of Internal Revenue.

Its center in Kuala Lumpur provides technical support, while its Indonesia facility offers back-office services.

“We have seen significant growth in our customer base and level of interest in our HR solutions that can be deployed OnDemand, OnPremise or as Business Process Outsourcing (BPO),” said Ettling.

“Our customers demand near-shoring as well as offshoring capabilities -- so we strive to right-shore for our clients, providing the right level of service, in the right location, at the right price.”