Among top three
countries for outsourcing
by
2013
Achievable
national goal for Thailand?
By Jon Fernquest 
Thailand
has been moving up
in the rankings
as an outsourcing
destination
for several years.Gartner, an expert on the global IT industry, issued a report earlier this year placing Thailand in top 30 outsourcing destinations worldwide (Read article).
Some outsourcing business such as call centers or medical transcripts favours countries such as India and the Philippines where English is almost a native language.
English language skills are not as essential in other areas of outsourcing.
Japan is one important destination for Thai outsourcing where Thailand does not suffer a linguistic disadvantage (Read article on 2006 Gartner report).
Today's article discusses other areas where Thailand is gaining market share such as IT outsourcing and COBOL programming (Read article on IBM 's IT outsourcing in Thailand).
Today's article begins after the vocabulary:
outsourcing - hiring
an outside company to do work instead of doing the work with employees
inside the company (sometimes to maintain a more flexible workforce,
sometimes to save money, sometimes to improve quality; usually the work
is not associated with the core business, outsourcing core business
might reveal firm secrets to outsiders, transferring business
or IT processes to an external service provider (See Wikipedia)
rankings - a list with the best first and the worst last
moving up in the rankings - get better and move towards first place in the list
an outsourcing destination - a country where people purchase outsourcing services
Gartner - one of the world's leading information technology research and advisory firms (See Wikipedia)
call centers, contact centers - a special center for answering large numbers of phone calls and helping callers (by providing information and doing tasks like reserving a seat on airplane or a room in a hotel) (See Wikipedia)
medical transcripts - converting voice-recorded reports as dictated by physicians and/or other healthcare professionals, into text format (See Wikipedia)
native language - the first (or one of the first) languages you learn when you are a child
suffer a linguistic disadvantage - not be able to do something because you don't know the necessary language
market share - the percentage of customers in a market that a company has
gaining market share - get more customers and have a higher percentage of the customers in a market
COBOL computer programming language - a programming language used for business, one of the oldest programming language (See Wikipedia)
rankings - a list with the best first and the worst last
moving up in the rankings - get better and move towards first place in the list
an outsourcing destination - a country where people purchase outsourcing services
Gartner - one of the world's leading information technology research and advisory firms (See Wikipedia)
call centers, contact centers - a special center for answering large numbers of phone calls and helping callers (by providing information and doing tasks like reserving a seat on airplane or a room in a hotel) (See Wikipedia)
medical transcripts - converting voice-recorded reports as dictated by physicians and/or other healthcare professionals, into text format (See Wikipedia)
native language - the first (or one of the first) languages you learn when you are a child
suffer a linguistic disadvantage - not be able to do something because you don't know the necessary language
market share - the percentage of customers in a market that a company has
gaining market share - get more customers and have a higher percentage of the customers in a market
COBOL computer programming language - a programming language used for business, one of the oldest programming language (See Wikipedia)
Thailand bids to lead world in outsourcing
Skills set and value for money attract investorsSUCHIT LEESA-NGUANSUK
9/09/2009
Thailand has set an ambitious target to become one of the world's top three countries for outsourcing by 2013, building a 4-billion-baht industry and forming an outsourcing association.
The kingdom's potential to capture opportunities as an attractive international IT outsourcing destination has led the driving industries to form the Thai IT Outsourcing Association, or TITO, said association chairman Steven Kalayanamit. The association is comprised of 10 pioneering international outsourcing companies.
According to a recent study, "Global Services Location Index 2009" by AT Kearney, Thailand ranks number four worldwide for locating outsourcing activities, including IT services and support, contact centers and back-office support, following India, China and Malaysia, which have retained the top three spots since 2004. However, Steven believes that unifying IT outsourcing companies into "One Nation, One Company" and offering unique, specialised skills will help Thailand surpass Malaysia at in number three by 2013.
X bids to Y - X
attempts to do Y
skills set - the
combined skills that a person or group has
value for money - everyone wants to receive high value for low cost (they want to get a lot for little, don't want to waste money)
an ambitious target - a difficult to achieve goal (will require great effort)
opportunities - benefits or profit that it is possible to get
capture opportunities - actually get the possible benefits
potential to capture opportunities - how likely or difficult it would be to get the possible benefits
Thai IT Outsourcing Association (TITO) - the industry association for companies doing outsourcing in Thailand
X comprised of Y - X has Y as its parts
pioneering - being the first one to do this
IT support - people who provide computer help, help people who are having problems using their computers
back-office support - the part of a company which does not deal directly with the public, activities not seen by customers such as administration, manufacturing, and developing the products or involved in but without being seen by customers, examples include IT departments that keep the phones and computers running (operations architecture), accounting, and human resources (See Wikipedia)
front-office - includes sales and other staff who deal directly with customers
retained the top three spots - kept the three highest positions
specialised skills - knowing a lot about a limited area of knowledge or job
surpass - go beyond
value for money - everyone wants to receive high value for low cost (they want to get a lot for little, don't want to waste money)
an ambitious target - a difficult to achieve goal (will require great effort)
opportunities - benefits or profit that it is possible to get
capture opportunities - actually get the possible benefits
potential to capture opportunities - how likely or difficult it would be to get the possible benefits
Thai IT Outsourcing Association (TITO) - the industry association for companies doing outsourcing in Thailand
X comprised of Y - X has Y as its parts
pioneering - being the first one to do this
IT support - people who provide computer help, help people who are having problems using their computers
back-office support - the part of a company which does not deal directly with the public, activities not seen by customers such as administration, manufacturing, and developing the products or involved in but without being seen by customers, examples include IT departments that keep the phones and computers running (operations architecture), accounting, and human resources (See Wikipedia)
front-office - includes sales and other staff who deal directly with customers
retained the top three spots - kept the three highest positions
specialised skills - knowing a lot about a limited area of knowledge or job
surpass - go beyond
Currently, there is no formal figure to show the scale of IT outsourcing in Thailand but rough estimates suggest a range of 800 million to 1.5 billon baht, with an average project value of 300 million baht. Within the next two years, the market should reach 4-5 billion baht.
"Thailand's attributes lie in its high talent level and good resources within a friendly business environment ,but there is still a need to boost confidence and awareness among the target market."
no formal figure - no
statistic or number given by the government or reliable researchers
scale of - the size of
estimates - an amount that you guess using available information
rough estimates - estimates are not very accurate
X suggests Y - X makes people believe Y
boost confidence - make people feel more sure about something
boost awareness - cause more people to know about something
scale of - the size of
estimates - an amount that you guess using available information
rough estimates - estimates are not very accurate
X suggests Y - X makes people believe Y
boost confidence - make people feel more sure about something
boost awareness - cause more people to know about something
He added that "Within the next three months, the association will launch a web portal to facilitate searches and business matching by using short video clips to introduce each members including business matching."
There is a great demand for outsourcing in the world market, with the industry expected to be worth $1.4 trillion (47 trillion baht) by the end of this year.
Therefore there is no need to focus on generating new business, so the association is seeking to promote Thailand's capabilities and high value-for-money to the existing market.
In the short term, Thailand can start with animation and digital content outsourcing, which fits in with Thailand's creativity profile, and others fields such as database management outsourcing services, accounting business process outsourcing and COBOL programming and development outsourcing.
In the long term, intelligent business outsourcing is an interesting area because there is a growing demand for customisation in this field, but it takes time to train new skill resources.
a web portal - a
website providing an entry point to the web, providing services such as
search engine, email, news, stock prices, information, and
entertainment (See Wikipedia)
launch a web portal - start a web portal
facilitate Y - help with activity or task Y
facilitate business matching - help businesses find other businesses (that can provide them with needed goods and services)
capabilities - the things that you are able to do and accomplish (skills)
animation - making cartoon or animated movies and videos
digital content - articles, photos, audio, and video on the web
a profile of Y - a summary description of Y, how y is different from others
Thailand's creativity profile - a description that shows how Thailand's creativity is different from others
database management - a collection of data stored in a computer (See Wikipedia)
accounting business process outsourcing -
COBOL programming and development - writing and testing COBOL computer programs
customisation - changing a product to meet and fit a customer's special needs
launch a web portal - start a web portal
facilitate Y - help with activity or task Y
facilitate business matching - help businesses find other businesses (that can provide them with needed goods and services)
capabilities - the things that you are able to do and accomplish (skills)
animation - making cartoon or animated movies and videos
digital content - articles, photos, audio, and video on the web
a profile of Y - a summary description of Y, how y is different from others
Thailand's creativity profile - a description that shows how Thailand's creativity is different from others
database management - a collection of data stored in a computer (See Wikipedia)
accounting business process outsourcing -
COBOL programming and development - writing and testing COBOL computer programs
customisation - changing a product to meet and fit a customer's special needs
Hintendra Patil, Chief Operating Officer of Saraff Infotech, an accounting and taxing business outsourcing service located in Bangkok, said joining this association will help the company find more new customers and local sub-contracting partners for its services to the US market.
"Thailand may not be the cheapest cost location but the accuracy and quality of services here help us to be competitive. However, high speed bandwidth and reasonable costs are important issues to address to strengthen Thailand's outsourcing capabilities because it is critical to the infrastructure of outsourcing services," he said.
Software Industry Promotion Agency (Sipa) director Rungreung Limshoopatipha added that Thailand has flexibility and creativity as outstanding points in its outsourcing portfolio , along with the Government's policy to build a creative economy through its "Creative Thailand" strategy.
The government can play a role in facilitating business matching with international customers to increase confidence in outsourcing providers and setting standards or a methodology for outsourcing contracts.
local sub-contracting partners
- companies in Thailand working with a foreign company (with an Indian
outsourcing giant, for example)
accuracy - the correctness of information (even in small details)
high speed bandwidth - fast internet
Software Industry Promotion Agency (Sipa) - set up by the Thai government in 2003 to develop and promote Thailand's software industry (See website)
a standard - an acceptable level of quality or achievement
setting standards - creating "acceptable levels of quality or achievement" to use
methodology - the way that something is done
accuracy - the correctness of information (even in small details)
high speed bandwidth - fast internet
Software Industry Promotion Agency (Sipa) - set up by the Thai government in 2003 to develop and promote Thailand's software industry (See website)
a standard - an acceptable level of quality or achievement
setting standards - creating "acceptable levels of quality or achievement" to use
methodology - the way that something is done
This year has seen a lot of success for Thailand in the outsourcing field, with contracts ranging from accounting business processes,TV animation series and biometric-related services to medical-related services generating business worth more than 1 billion baht
An emerging service is COBOL programming outsourcing for the banking in Europe market, which, while still in need of maintenance, can boast a skills resource in Thailand of some 1,000 professionals.
"Over the next three to six months, Sipa will support the retraining of 200 COBOL developers.
"This should help to convince foreign investors to consider basing their outsourcing operations in Thailand," Rung-reung concluded.
biometric -
measurement of human biological data with a computer, especially for
indentifying (See Wikipedia)
can boast Y - have achieved Y which they can tell the public about proudly
convince - make people believe in something
basing operations in Y - locating the basic activities of a business in Thailand
basing their outsourcing operations in Thailand
can boast Y - have achieved Y which they can tell the public about proudly
convince - make people believe in something
basing operations in Y - locating the basic activities of a business in Thailand
basing their outsourcing operations in Thailand
(Source: Thailand bids to lead world in outsourcing, Skills set and value for money attract investors, SUCHIT LEESA-NGUANSUK, 9/09/2009, link)
