ePLDT's SPI Making Deals in India

Here's another little tidbit on the globalization front. SPI, a Philippine BPO owned by the nation's largest telecommunications company, is looking to buy Indian companies as it expands its presence in the subcontinent. In the meantime, Indian companies are scouting in SPI's backyard for suitable acquisition candidates in the race to bulk up and develop a full service line. Now which of the many BPO companies around today will become the household name in 2020?

Global healthcare, legal and publishing business process outsourcing company SPi is looking out for suitable acquisitions in India. Ernest L Cu, president and chief executive officer of the Philippines-headquartered Spi, said the company has allocated $50 million for mergers and acquisitions. The company is in talks with investment bankers and is considering several proposals, Cu said while addressing the media here on Wednesday. According to Cu, SPi plans to move its medical billing work to India from the US. He said the setting up of new delivery centre in Chennai and the cost differential between the US and India has made the company favour shifting of medical billing business to Chennai in eight months. The business has the potential to create 150 new jobs. SPi Technologies inaugurated its new 17,000 sq ft facility in the city on Wednesday. The 1,100-seat facility will house the company's publishing and healthcare business operations. The new centre will be the company's fourth in the country after Pondicherry, Coimbatore and New Delhi. Cu said the Indian company would increase its headcount by 700 by the end of this year. In 2003, SPi through its wholly owned Indian subsidiary SPi Technologies Private Ltd
acquired the Pondicherry-based Kolam Information Services Private Ltd, a book
publishing BPO. Two years later, it acquired the medical transcriptions business
of KG Information Services and Technologies Private Ltd in Coimbatore.