PeopleSupport P0.5B Expansion in the Philippines
PeopleSupport Inc., the country’s leading call center operator, is investing P502 million for its two-phased expansion program in Baguio City. This as the company embarks on a massive expansion program that includes property acquisition and new sites abroad in anticipation of future growth. Renerio Borja, PeopleSupport president, said that phase 1 of the Baguio project has an investment of P182 million and would have a capacity of 500 seats while phase 2 has 1,500 seats for a total capacity of 2,000 seats.
Phase 1 will started taking calls on February 26 while the second phase broke ground on February 21 and is expected to hit full capacity by 2008. Both phases are being leased through SM Cyberzone Building in Baguio City.
At present, PeopleSupport has three buildings in Makati, a build-to-suit center along the corner Buendia-Ayala, Robinsons Summit and at 6780. It has two facilities in Asiatown IT Park in Cebu and a training facility in Davao.
Despite these sites, Borja said the company is still on the lookout for new lots to be acquired for its future growth.
In fact, the company has already created a propertyarm -the PeopleSupport Properties Inc. to meet the government’s ownership requirement for property acquisition.
The newly-formed company has already acquired the 2,000 square meter lot from the Fort Bonifacio Development Corp. for .8 million, approximately P340 million, in the Global City right beside the HSBC building. The area has been declared as E-Square under the Philippine Economic Zone Authority.
According to Borja, the plan is to build a 25-storey building for its internal requirements. The building could very well house over 6,000 seats.
“This would be the future site of our expansion program and there might be some relocation of existing staff including that of the 6780 center, which is now occupying two of the six leased floors,” he said.
The planned groundbreaking for the Fort Bonifacio property is by April but this might be delayed due to election period.
“Once completed, this would be the biggest single facility for business process outsourcing in the country,” Borja said.
PeopleSupport is the most aggressive BPO firm in the country today. It pioneered in putting up its own build-to-suit building and is now acquiring new lots for future growth particularly in the south.
source: www.goodnewspilipinas.com
