IT-BPM sector drafts new 6-year roadmap

MANILA, Philippines – The information technology and business process management (IT-BPM) industry is eyeing an ambitious target of doubling revenues and hiring at least a million more direct employees over the next six years.

In its bid to maintain the growth momentum of the country’s IT-BPM industry, the Information Technology and Business Process Association of the Philippines (IBPAP) and partner Frost & Sullivan recently commenced research and dialogues with internal and external stakeholders toward creating the country’s IT-BPM Roadmap 2022.

“As we hit our growth targets for the original Roadmap 2016, we need to unveil a new industry game plan that will enable our country’s IT-BPM sector to achieve continued remarkable growth and contributions to the economy. The global market and technology trends we are seeing present significant opportunities to the Philippines,” IBPAP executive committee chairman Benedict Hernandez said.

Based on initial discussions for the new blueprint, Hernandez said the industry’s ambition towards 2022 is to create another one million higher-value direct jobs in IT-BPM over the next six years.

He said with an additional three to four indirect jobs created per direct job in the industry, a total of four to five million new jobs in the country are expected to be generated during the period.

“We crossed the million mark recently and it took us about almost 15 years to get to that. We are trying to be ambitious and say let’s go for another one million over the next six years,” Hernandez said.

With the industry’s initial target of generating at least one million direct employment, Hernandez said IT-BPM’s total revenues could easily double by 2022 from its 2016 level.

“At the very least I could say, yes (double the revenues by 2022). What technology does is it enables the human person to be more productive and more effective in doing their jobs. Technology, what it does is for the same number of people, you can create a better economic output. So it would be an opportunity that revenues will actually be larger,” he added.

The Philippine IT-BPM Roadmap 2016 has targeted to generate $25 billion revenues and 1.3 million direct employees.

After the industry employed 1.15 million people and generated $21.5 billion revenues as of end-2015, the industry expects the 2016 targets under the original roadmap to be met.

“As a preferred destination for IT-BPM work, the Philippines has been growing at more than twice the global market growth rate over the last five years. With a rapid evolution of digital technology and the changing preferences of clients, we will have an opportunity to accelerate our shift to higher-value services,” Hernandez said.

The Philippine IT-BPM Roadmap 2022 is a comprehensive six-year plan to chart the growth course of the industry as it faces fast-evolving technology, shifting political and regulatory environment, changing preferences of clients, as well as the implications of automation and artificial intelligence.

The Roadmap 2022 will also seek to identify how the country can continue to push more investments and job creation outside Metro Manila.

“The new roadmap will show how all industry stakeholders can work as one, our sights focused on a single goal, which is to create an enabling ecosystem that will nurture the needs of the industry in the areas of education, business environment and countrywide development,” IBPAP chairman Danilo Reyes said.

Source: http://goo.gl/8e9WT8