Aegis sets its sights on financial services sector growth in SL
View(s):The local unit of a foreign Back Process Outsourcing (BPO) company, which opened a new, 600-seat business services delivery centre in Colombo last week, has plans to hire 650 employees over the next 12 months, adding to its existing 350 personnel in Sri Lanka.
This company, Aegis, also signalled that this initial 1,000-member unit would act as a proof of concept to attract bigger customers to enter into the Sri Lankan market, as well as even allowing it to explore the feasibility of shared services type offerings out of this country.
Currently, the company only services telco brands such as Airtel and Hutch, but it expects to soon go after clients in all other sectors, but mainly in Banking, Financial Services and Insurance (BFSI) vertical, which mirrors international trends for this sector that has seen most of its growth come from telecommunications and BFSI. A wholly owned subsidiary of India’s US$ 39 billion Essar group, Aegis entered the local market in 2009 with the acquisition of an 80 per cent stake in local BPO company Ismart-Timex. Additionally, company representatives also commented that, from the back office side, banking and finance are the areas on which the company would focus. Further, it was also noted that the company had plans to set up more delivery centres in tier two and three towns in the North and South and is currently in discussions with the relevant government bodies towards this end.
(JH)