Egypt: The Great Sphinx of African BPO Outsourcing Rises!

In July 2007, AT Kearney ranked Egypt 13th in their list of top 50 outsourcing destinations worldwide.   This placed Egypt at the top-most position among all African countries featured in the report, an annual compilation by the well-respected research company.  
 
Indeed, Egypt is currently one of the most important players in Africa’s outsourcing space, with several Egypt-based BPO companies achieving considerable success.   Although the BPO industry in Egypt is relatively young, the country has attracted investment from both indigenous and international organizations, a few of which I will discuss in this article.  
 
MEET THE PLAYERS  
 
Egypt entered the international outsourcing space in May 2003, when Xceed, the country’s first international call centre, opened its doors for business.  
 
Xceed was established in 2001, primarily as the IT arm of Telecom Egypt, the incumbent telecommunications operator. One of Xceed’s immediate plans was to create and operate a call centre capable of serving Telecom Egypt’s client base of several million subscribers.  
 
In a recent conversation I had with Chairman and CEO Dr Adel Danish , Dr Adel recounted how Xceed successfully built a state-of-the-art call centre in a record one year, with an initial capacity of 1200 seats. Of this, 300 seats would serve Telecom Egypt, while the rest were set to target international markets.   Continue reading