Call Centres & Business Process Outsourcing (BPO)

Call centres and Business Process Outsourcing (BPO) are among the key sectors identified as growth industries by the Western Cape’s investment and trade promotion agency, Wesgro. The lead sectors within the industry are telecommunications, retail and financial services.

The potential for South Africa to grow its BPO offering has been identified by the Department of Trade and Industry (dti), which has been proactive in establishing incentives for inward investment. The Western Cape believes that it has particular advantages over and above its excellent infrastructure and communications networks. The City of Cape Town offers a predominantly English-speaking population, with an accent that is fairly neutral. The local industry is also able to offer services in German, Dutch, French and Italian.

South Africans generally share cultural similarities with the sector’s main target markets: the UK and the US. South Africans are exposed to influences from both these regions and so are themselves familiar with their products. The Western Cape has a large and skilled workforce, a product of its four major tertiary education institutions, as well as sector-specific training initiatives. Logistically, the Western Cape is in a similar time zone to the UK and Europe, and only ever between six and nine hours different from the US, making it significantly easier to manage international services.

The call centre and BPO sector is one of the fastest-growing sectors in the Western Cape, employing more and more people every year and making an increasingly significant contribution to the regional economy and overall economic growth in the province. The number of call agents grew by 28.5% between 2006/07 and 2007/08, according to a report done for CallingtheCape by Deloitte.

The total economic impact of the sector on the regional economy is estimated to be between R2.5-billion and R3.3-billion, and there are now more than 20 000 full-time agents working in the Cape Town area, located in Claremont, Century City, central Cape Town and Bellville. In total, the industry employs approximately 28 000 individuals.

The acquisition in 2009 by Indian giant, Aegis, of one of South Africa’s largest privately owned call centre companies, Call Centre Nucleus (CCN), is a sign of the attractiveness of South Africa as a destination for such operations. Aegis intends investing R500‑million over three years and growing the CCN workforce from 1 000 to 6 000. In its international operations, Aegis operates in the US, Kenya, Costa Rica and the Philippines. To cope with the growth of its Indian centres, the company recruits 1 000 new people every year.

ONLINE RESOURCES
Business Process enabling South Africa (BPeSA): www.bpesa.org.za
CallingtheCape: www.callingthecape.org
National Department of Trade and Industry: www.dti.gov.za