Investment Data Reveals State of Interest in Latin America Locations
January 25th, 2012By Reshaad Durgahee
Lima, Peru: Surprisingly emerging.
In the period 2003 through 2010, Europe and Asia were the largest recipient regions of foreign investment projects in shared services and BPO activities, accounting for 46% and 29% respectively. Meanwhile, interest in Latin America has clearly been growing. The number of shared services and BPO foreign investment projects in Latin America rose year on year until 2010, when the total number of projects entering the region decreased by 15%.
Costa Rican ICT Market Finally Breathing Life of Liberalization
November 22nd, 2011
President Chinchilla kisses goodbye to monopolies.
By Dan Berthiaume
The Costa Rican telecom market is undergoing a period of intense growth that should last at least through 2016, according to a new report from Pyramid Research.
“Costa Rica: Surging Market Gives Operators More Devices, Access and Content to Sell” identifies two key factors in what is expected to be a robust increase in adoption of Costa Rican mobile services: The emergence of competition from pan-regional operators to dominant local telecom player ICE (Costa Rica Institute of Electricity), and exceptionally strong growth in use of mobile data.
Costa Rica Comes to Grips with its Lack of Support for Entrepreneurs
November 10th, 2011Part I: Risk-takers should be applauded not frowned upon, say pioneering entrepreneurs
By Patrick Haller
In Costa Rica tradition dictates that university graduates should get a job with either an established, national company, or with one of the major US multinationals, such as Intel, now based in and around San Jose. Facing stigmatization, the risk of failure, lack of funding, growing pains and steep competition for clients and qualified employees, there are some Costa Rican who have chosen a different path.
Costa Rica’s Free Trade Zones Not Looking So “Free” After All
October 18th, 2011
Chinchilla is at odds with the head of CINDE, Costa Rica's lead investment agency
By Luke Bujarski
Costa Rica’s system of free trade zones may not be “free” for much longer, if a controversial tax on products and services exporters gets bundled into the government’s latest deficit reduction plan. While local authorities, including President Laura Chinchilla, confirmed with Nearshore Americas that the new tax proposal would not affect existing companies, many are worried that a change to current policy would rock the proverbial boat, and send mixed signals to an otherwise bullish foreign investment community. NSAM also notes that a policy which favors existing companies over new entrants could open the door for hostilities between the public and private sector.
Chinchilla and CINDE Focus on Courting Investors in New York City
September 21st, 2011
By Luke Bujarski
Before heading over to the UN General Assembly, President of Costa Rica Laura Chinchilla took the morning to engage investors at the Four Seasons Hotel in New York City. In addressing those lining up for a closer look at what the “Rich Coast” has to offer, Madame President left much of the talking around investment opportunities up to her senior delegation. Of course, the group would not have been complete without Mr. Jose Rossi, President of CINDE Costa Rica’s renowned investment promotional agency in charge of promoting the country as the “best export platform in the Western Hemisphere.”
IBM Commits to Another 1,000 Hires in Costa Rica, Dismissing Talk of a Labor Shortage
September 6th, 2011
Patrick Haller
When IBM launched a BPO operations in Costa Rica in 2004, the firm was cautiously optimistic about its potential. Over the last eight years, IBM has certainly shown that it has learned its way around San Jose. Carl Ingersoll (left), who has been Director of IBM Costa Rica for about a year, is now set to drive the operation ever further – hiring as many as 1,000 new employees over the next few years in an ambitious plan to ramp up exported services.
Latin America Captives: Costa Rica and Panama Poised to See Shared Services Expansion
August 17th, 2011
Rutchik: Captives remove 'incremental risk' of third-party deals
Pace Harmon’s top captives expert talks about maturity of captives, impact from Mexico’s violence and why labor laws favor third-party outsourcers
By Luke Bujarski
Everest Group’s most recent quarterly Market Vista Report came out in recent weeks with some potentially staggering implications for Latin America’s offshoring landscape. The global tally recorded a new 42-month high with 61 new captive announcements and zero divestitures. Yet most of these announcements were located in Asia, followed by Eastern Europe and Africa. What then are LatAm’s prospects for captive operators?
Karamouzis: Deliver value or perish.
Exploring why Nearshoring has become “survival of the fittest”
By Patrick Haller
The offshore services sector has come a long way since the nascent years of coding and platform development, moving to infrastructure, remote management and knowledge processing, among other things. The next growth cycle, however has a distinctly Darwinian flavor, says Research Vice President at Gartner, Frances Karamouzis.
StarTek’s Carlson: In the BPO World, It’s Getting Tougher to Find the ‘Right Conditions’
July 22nd, 2011
By Patrick Haller
In the U.S., executives are making decisions about Latin America based on emotions and not fact… in India, customers are now looking for something different… in the Philippines, wage pressures…. in Egypt, “superior” English skills… Western Europe, nearshoring to Eastern Europe….
Source: MarketWatch/Business Wire
DENVER — StarTek, a leading provider of business process outsourcing services, announced today the signing of a lease for a new contact center in San Pedro Sula, Honduras. The center is expected to open late in the third quarter of 2011.
“The addition of a center in Honduras was driven by client needs,” said Chad Carlson, StarTek’s President and Chief Executive Officer. “We have experienced great success with our StarTek Costa Rica facility and went searching for another bilingual, educated population in a country with a stable democratic government which ultimately led us to Honduras. This further expansion into Latin America is consistent with our plans to continue to grow our global footprint.”
The center is located in the Altia Business Park in San Pedro Sula. The city of over 800,000 is home to seven institutions of higher learning and is the second largest city in Honduras.
