Contact us | +971 4 3635663
Sponsored by   Mudabala
Middle East Business Information
 
 
LoadingLoading ...
Tue, 02 Dec 2008 | 21:59 GMT

Egypt poised to loosen India's grip on huge global outsourcing market

Gulf News
 
 

Sunday, Jul 08, 2007

Gulf News

Dubai: Egypt is well on its way to establishing itself as an important player in the lucrative and fast-growing offshore outsourcing market. But it must take some steps to facilitate its ascendance in this market if it is to become the India of the Middle East, says a Yankee Group report.

India continues to be an outsourcing behemoth, leading the offshore outsourcing market both in IT outsourcing and business process outsourcing (BPO).

Currently, India holds about 60 per cent of the overall offshore market, with revenue climbing to more than $6 billion last year in the BPO sector alone, and $22 billion in overall revenue.

"Egypt, a relatively new entrant to this segment, has some unique advantages as well as some structural and perceptual problems which the government must address to facilitate the ascendance of this market if it wants to reap the economic benefits of outsourcing opportunities," says Tony Marson, Yankee Group senior analyst and report co-author.

Ambitious plan

The Egyptian government has set an ambitious target for the country to reach $1.1 billion of the global outsourcing market by 2010, quadrupling from its 2005 revenue.

Companies such as CiscoCiscoLoading..., Google, IBMIBMLoading..., MicrosoftMicrosoftLoading..., OracleOracleLoading... and Orange Business Services are already exploiting Egypt's IT talent pool.

Mindy Blodgett, Yankee Group analyst says if Egypt can see where India has stumbled, perhaps it can head off some of the same obstacles India is facing today in trying to keep pace with the fast-growing outsourcing demand. Both Egypt and India allow high levels of foreign ownership of ICT companies. The allowed foreign ownership level in India is 75 per cent, while in Egypt there is no limit. In both countries, this will have a positive effect on GDP.

"Although India is far ahead of Egypt in terms of the development of IT service outsourcing, the basic indicators suggest that Egypt's ICT infrastructure is far ahead of India's ICT infrastructure. The penetration of both internet users and telephone subscribers in Egypt is three times higher than in India. Egypt will need to use this significant advantage to accelerate its development in the IT services market," says Marson. India is also grappling with several thorny labour and workforce issues.

Adding to the workforce challenges are the many infrastructure woes plaguing India like the poorly planned roads in the leading outsourcing centres.

New horizons

The Egyptian IT industry is between 15 and 20 years behind India in its development cycle and its outsourcing IT services. However, there is growing interest from Middle Eastern countries in outsourcing BPO to Egypt instead of India or Europe; this is particularly the case in the GCC.

According to the data by Mediterranean Investment Project Observatory, the GCC accounts for 29 per cent of all of Egypt's projects by value - the largest group of newly announced investment projects.

The Egyptian government forecasts that foreign direct investment by year-end will reach $8 billion, an increase of 31 per cent.

© Gulf News 2007. All rights reserved.

 
 
 
Community Comments (0) - Comment on this article
The opinions of the authors expressed herein do not necessarily state or reflect Zawya. Read our Comment Policy.
 
 
 
Loading ...
 
Loading ...
Zawya Comment Policy:
 
  1. Zawya encourages you to add a comment to this discussion. You agree that when you add content to this discussion your comments will not:
    1.1   Contain any material which is libelous or defamatory of any person, is obscene, offensive, hateful or inflammatory or causes damage to the reputation of any person or organisation.
    1.2   Promote sexually explicit material, violence, discrimination based on race, sex, religion, nationality, disability, sexual orientation or age or any illegal activity.
    1.3   Be made in breach of any legal duty owed to a third party, such as a contractual duty or a duty of confidence.
    1.4   Be threatening, abuse or invade another’s privacy, or cause annoyance, inconvenience or needless anxiety.
    1.5   Be used to impersonate any person, to misrepresent your identity or affiliation with any person, or be likely to deceive any person.
    1.6   Give the impression that they represent Zawya.
    1.7   Advocate, promote or assist any unlawful act such as (by way of example only) copyright infringement or computer misuse.
  2. The content posted on www.zawya.com is created by members of the public. The views expressed are theirs and unless specifically stated are not those of Zawya. Zawya reserves the right to review all comments prior to posting and edit or delete any contribution, but Zawya is not responsible for and can not be held liable for any content posted by members of the public on www.zawya.com.
  3. Zawya is not responsible for the availability or content of any third party sites that are accessible through www.zawya.com. Any links to third party websites from www.zawya.com do not amount to any endorsement of that site by Zawya and any use of that site by you is at your own risk.
  4. By submitting your comment, you hereby give Zawya the right, but not the obligation, to post, air, edit, exhibit, telecast, webcast, re-use, publish, reproduce, use, license, print, distribute or otherwise use your comments worldwide, in perpetuity.
 
 
 
Community Buzz

Stories

Companies

Most viewed companies by Community in the last 24 hrs
Company Name Country Industry
Aabar Investments UAE Investment Firms and Funds
Nakheel UAE Landlords and Developers
Saudi Binladin Group Saudi Arabia Construction and Design
Abu Dhabi Investment Council UAE Investment Firms and Funds
Consolidated Contractors Company Overseas Construction and Design
Qatari Diar Real Estate Investment Company Qatar Landlords and Developers
Qatar Investment Authority Qatar Investment Firms and Funds
Abu Dhabi Investment Authority UAE Investment Firms and Funds
Dubai Islamic Bank UAE Banking
Barwa Real Estate Company Qatar Landlords and Developers
 

Projects

Most viewed projects by Community in the last 24 hrs
Project Name Country Sector
Dubai RTA - Dubai Metro - Purple Line UAE Infrastructure
Emirates Aluminium (EMAL) - Smelter Complex UAE Industry
Qatar Foundation - Sidra Hospital Qatar Real Estate
IPIC - Abu Dhabi Crude Oil Pipeline (ADCOP) UAE Oil and Gas
KNPC - Al Zour Refinery Kuwait Oil and Gas
Qatalum Aluminum Smelter Qatar Industry
Abu Dhabi Municipality - Salam Street and Mina Road Development UAE Infrastructure
Ras Tanura Integrated Refinery and Petrochemicals Complex Saudi Arabia Oil and Gas
Nakheel - Dubai Waterfront UAE Real Estate
ADCO - SAS Field Development UAE Oil and Gas
 

Blogs

 
 

 
 
 
 
 
Quote data provided by © TickerChart
Site is optimised for viewing at 1024 x 768 with Internet Explorer v6 and Firefox v1.5 and above.
Copyright © 2008 ABQ Zawya Ltd. All rights reserved. Please read our Membership Agreement