Assessment of the Asia-Pacific Contact Center Market

This Frost & Sullivan research service titled Assessment of the Asia-Pacific Contact Center Market provides market trends, drivers, restraints, and sizing across the six regions of Greater China, India, Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN), Australia and New Zealand (ANZ), South Korea, and Japan. The types of contact centers covered are hosted contact center, outsourced contact center, in-house contact center, and captive contact center. In this research, Frost & Sullivan's expert analysts thoroughly examine the following vertical markets: banking, financial services and insurance (BFSI), consumer goods, government and education, outsourced contact centers, others include healthcare, manufacturing, professional services, IT, telecommunications and travel and hospitality.

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Market Overview

A 9.8 Percent Growth in Agent Base Cements Asia Pacific’s Status as the Fastest Growing Region for Contact Center Services

Increasing Focus on Quality Bodes Well for Establishments with Trained and Experienced Professionals

With the global economic downturn heaving its last gasp in 2010, enterprises are reviving expenditure on customer service. To meet the rising customer demand, the region recorded a 9.7 percent growth in contact center agent seats to reach 2.5 million in 2011, and by 2018, it is expected to have grown at a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 8.1 percent to touch 4.0 million. All emerging markets are expected to maintain double digit growth for the same period, leading the overall market development for Asia Pacific. This region will also demonstrate the highest growth in the global contact center outsourcing in 2012 and beyond. Much of this growth will be driven by the upswing in domestic demand, especially from the telecommunications and banking and finance (BFS) sectors. However, this rapid growth in the number of contact center outsourcers will spark off concerns about market saturation. Markets in countries such as Singapore, Hong Kong, and Taiwan are already showing signs of saturation and are on the higher-end of the growth curve. Over the next five years, the Philippines and India will share these concerns.

“Contact center owners in the Asia Pacific will credit most of their success to the region’s large and cheap labor pool with considerable English and regional language skills, solid infrastructure, and cultural similarities with western countries,” says the analyst of this research. The intensifying focus on quality customer service has piqued the interest of domestic enterprises, which has, in turn, raised the level of competition in emerging markets. Customer service enhancement continues to receive priority, as enterprises are investing more capital in contact centers that offer superior client satisfaction. Therefore, agents with professional skills and experience are in great demand. While agent numbers are likely to escalate across the region, the market will also experience significant attrition. The attrition rates in the Asia Pacific contact center market will be higher than the rates in other markets due to high stress levels and career opportunities in other industries. In 2011, while the average attrition rate for the Asia Pacific contact center market as a whole was approximately 19.1 percent; India’s alone was nearly 25 percent.

One of the main reasons for agents’ lack of stickiness with the job is that with most organizations attempting to cut costs, the wages of contact center agents have remained relatively low in the past three years. “Many enterprises were investing more on system upgrades rather than in improving agents’ interpersonal skills and domain knowledge,” notes the analyst. “Fortunately, this trend is phasing out with outsourcers recognizing the importance of having well-trained and well-recompensed agents.” Contact center service segments including consulting, implementation, management, and agents’ training services have risen in importance for vendors and system integrators. Consequently, contact center providers in the region are slowly expanding their offerings to include non-voice, back-office operations such as knowledge process outsourcing (KPO), financial and accounting outsourcing (FAO), and human resources outsourcing (HRO).

Market Sectors

Expert Frost & Sullivan analysts thoroughly examine the following market sectors in this research:

By Contact Center Type

• Hosted contact center
• Outsourced contact center
• In-house contact center
• Captive contact center

By Vertical Segment

• Banking, Financial Services and Insurance (BFSI)
• Consumer Goods
• Government and Education
• Outsourced Contact Centers
• Others include Healthcare, Manufacturing, Professional Services
• IT, Telecommunications
• Travel & Hospitality

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