The digitalization of the country is now a reality and will generate $1 billion by 2018, according to the Prime Minister’s ICT Advisor, Sajeeb Wazed Joy as he inaugurated the BPO Summit at the Sonargaon Hotel in Dhaka.
BPO (Business Process Outsourcing) is a growing worldwide sector with an industry worth over $500 billion. India, Sri Lanka, and the Philippines are currently leading the global BPO industry where their market sizes are worth $140 billion, $3 billion, and $22 billion, respectively.
The theme for this year’s BPO Summit was “Local Experience, Global Business.” It identified that Bangladesh has advantages in the following areas:
• Competitive cost advantages over other emerging countries
• Prioritization after being identified as a thrust sector by the government
• Geographical time zone advantage
Referring to the government’s direct backing of the BPO sector, Joy said the ICT Division had taken up a project to create 40,000 technocrats given Bangladesh’s growing annual demand for manpower in this sphere. He also explained that ten IT training centers would be opened throughout Bangladesh to train people for employment in this industry.
Each year, the country produces about 10,000 computer science graduates, many of whom were working in companies like Google, Facebook, and Microsoft, he added.
“The country has 60 million Internet users, and there is 100% telecommunication network at present,” Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina’s son proclaimed. According to him, Bangladesh was second among the South Asian countries regarding the socio-economic development index.
Joy said e-textbooks would soon be available while PDF versions of school textbooks were already in circulation alongside printed ones.
State Minister for ICT, Zunaid Ahmed Palak, who was also present, said BPOs had to be strengthened in the domestic market if the country was to shine in international trade. The BPO sector began rolling in 2009 with only 300 employees. The number has risen to 30,000 at present, Palak said.
On the sideline of the summit, ten seminars were held across two days on the 28th and 29th with fifty local speakers and twenty international speakers sharing their opinions.
