{"id":4663,"date":"2008-12-14T11:40:00","date_gmt":"2008-12-14T11:40:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/localhost\/projects\/horsesforsources\/horses-outsourcing-predictions-for-2009\/"},"modified":"2008-12-14T11:40:00","modified_gmt":"2008-12-14T11:40:00","slug":"horses-outsourcing-predictions-for-2009","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.horsesforsources.com\/horses-outsourcing-predictions-for-2009\/","title":{"rendered":"Horses outsourcing predictions for 2009"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Ingsoc\" <\/strong><\/span><\/a>Yes, it's that time again folks, when analysts and other industry wannabe needle-movers come up with some profound verbiage that they think gets everyone excited for a few days, and hope no-one re-reads in 6 months.  Well… I occasionally do some research in my spare time, so here are some thoughts on what we can probably expect to see happen (just don't bookmark this page and hold it against me):<\/strong><\/span><\/em><\/p>\n

Low-hanging fruit outsourcing with immediate cost-savings will be strong.<\/strong>  As we discussed and surveyed here<\/a>, it's areas where enterprises can streamline initial costs over a contract and get an immediate impact on the bottom-line.  That's bread-and-butter application outsourcing, high-arbitrage BPO areas such as F&A and vertical-specific analytics (that KPO stuff<\/a>).  I am also expecting increased adoption of procurement BPO models as increased procurement and supply management work is moved offshore, and buyers can benefit from labor arbitrage to underpin the transformation costs that have held back adoption in the past. \n<\/p>\n


\nMany initiatives which require incremental upfront investment that cannot be tied directly to revenue-metrics will suffer.  The back-end of Q1, Q2 and Q3 2009 will be busy times for outsourcing deal activity.<\/p>\n

The onshore\/offshore decision-process is reversed to "why should this stay onshore?"<\/strong>  The traditional evaluation methodology for companies' outsourcing and offshoring opportunities is fast-changing.  Rather than companies determining which processes can<\/em> be carried out from a remote location, most will be determining why processes need to be carried out onshore<\/em>.  <\/p>\n

Services firms will be forced to consolidate.<\/strong>  With deals getting smaller and more plentiful, combined with renewed pressure on services firms to hold-back on hiring, the need for added global scale and staff resources, process and technology expertise, are going to drive consolidation at a much more aggressive pace than we saw in 2008.  Most outsourcing service providers are currently waiting out the year to get a firm picture on how to address their go-to-market strategies after the New year.  I predict these to take several forms:<\/p>\n