BPO involves a company contracting the operations and responsibilities of specific business functions such as customer related and administrative functions to a third-party service provider. When this is done outside of a company's country it is referred to as offshore outsourcing.
International and local companies choose Cape Town as their preferred global service location, which explains the growing number of call centres, also known as contact centres, located in the heart of Cape Town.
Call centres are a major source of economic growth for the CBD creating 7500 jobs and generating approximately R1.7 billion rand to the provincial GDP. This figure is expected to grow significantly, especially on the back of international investment and expansion from current outsourcers in 2013 and beyond.
Three of the world's largest business processing outsources; Teleperformance, Serco and Capita have recently invested in and are operating out of the CBD. These currently house the contact centres of brands such as Shop Direct, the UK's largest online and home shopping retailer, and EE (Orange/T-Mobile), the largest mobile network operator in the UK.
"The CBD continues to see growth in the contact centre industry as more outsourcing companies both locally and abroad notice the consistency of excellence and quality the environment offers. We are proud that prominent brands and local company contact centres such as Metropolitan Health, Edcon, Woolworths, ASDA, Lufthansa, Shell, Bloomberg and Wonga call the CBD home and look forward to welcoming more brands to this premier business destination," says Rob Kane, chairman of the Central City Improvement District (CCID).
Gareth Pritchard, CEO of Business Process enabling South Africa says that the central city as the central business hub in the Western Cape serves as an ideal service base for contact centre operations in the province.
"The CBD is very popular with both local and international companies due to its good transport links, excellent infrastructure, availability of property and access to a large, educated talent pool. There is a growing base of high end skills in financial and legal services amongst the talent pool, making it an ideal customer service base and highlighting it as a world class offshoring location."
Countries, such as India, were typically seen as the world's favoured market for BPO companies, among other competitors, such as Australia, China and the Philippines.
"South Africa is definitely coming into its own in terms of growth in the sector as it has scooped two Offshoring Destination of the Year Awards, which were awarded by the National and European Outsourcing Associations, both awards confirming its status as a leading BPO destination," says Pritchard.
According to Kane, the central location, cleanliness and safety of the Cape Town CBD are all factors that contribute to the CBD being picked time again as a business destination of choice by local and international companies alike.
Nils Flaatten, CEO of Wesgro, the Western Cape's Destination Marketing, Investment and Trade Promotion Agency, recently welcomed news of an additional investment in Cape Town by Swiss-based airline; Edelweiss Air AG, which increased its commitment to the destination by investing in Cape Town-based call centre, Mindpearl. "This investment taps into the city's strong BPO sector and makes Edelweiss the second international airline to do so. Capetonians will now man this call centre and deliver high class services to its international passengers," Flaatten said.
