The BPO industry has really been a boon for those who started out early. And Intelenet Global Services is one such player. Started in 2000 as a joint venture between HDFC bank and TCS with 25 employees the company has grown to over 25,000 employees and features in the Top 15 BPO Ranking FY07-08, has over 65 clients and is present in India, Philippines, Mauritius, USA and Central America. And at the helm is Susir Kumar, CEO since the creation of the company.

Susir Kumar has seen the company through its ups and downs, various fundings, acquisitions, takeovers, awards and overall growth. A company secretary by qualification Kumar started his career with Mangalore Refineries and was the company secretary and chief of recoveries in HDFC Bank. The year 2000 saw the beginning of the BPO industry. “Since I had the experience of setting up several group companies, I was approached by Deepak Parekh, Chairman-HDFC with the idea of setting up a 3rd party customer service delivery network. And since then there has been no looking back,” he says.

The Intelenet growth story started in 2000 with just 25 people in Mahape near Mumbai. Kumar initially held the position of Director in this joint venture between HDFC and Tata Consultancy Services (TCS). “In 2000, when I was approached with the idea of setting up a third party BPO, I had no experience in the BPO segment. The industry too was beginning to take shape at the time. I found the opportunity to be a fresh, new challenge and an excellent learning curve,” quips Kumar.

Being a banker proved to be an asset in approaching companies/ prospective clients in the banking and financial services segments. By 2002 Intelenet had grown to 550 employees working across 2 contact centers, which phenomenally jumped to about 3000 employees operating out of 3 contact centers providing a host of services to over 10 blue chip companies by the year 2003. In December 2004, with the joint venture between HDFC and Barclays, both the parent companies reaffirmed their faith in Intelenet and Kumar was designated as the CEO.

Intelenet was also an early bird when it came to the domestic market. In the year 2006, the company acquired Sparsh, which was India’s largest domestic BPO from Spanco Telesystems. This gave the company a head start in the domestic space. “In just 3 short years our domestic business has grown from just 3000 to over 16000 people in 7 locations providing BPO services in 14 Indian languages Intelenet’s domestic business has also been rated number 1 in the Indian BPO space by leading IT business magazine Dataquest.,” he adds.

In 2007 leading global private equity (PE) investor Blackstone group acquired 100% stake in Intelenet, with backing from the BPO’s management team. This marked the exit of HDFC and Barclays bank. The two sold their stakes to SKR BPO services, co-owned by Blackstone GVP Capital and Intelenet management, for an undisclosed amount. However, industry sources pegged the figure at around 420 million dollars (over Rs 1,700 crore).

When asked about the companies focus on the domestic market Kumar is quick to quote the joint report by consultancy firm Everest Group and India’s National Association of Software and Services Companies (NASSCOM) at its current growth rate, India’s $11 billion BPO industry will reach about $30 billion by 2012. Over 25% of Intelenet’s revenues are generated from the domestic market. “We plan to ride this wave of the domestic BPO boom and consolidate our position further by focusing on areas that are traditionally considered weak in the domestic BPO sector such as cost savings through process improvements, technology and systems etc,” he says.

Kuamr recognizes the rising pressures on costs and bottom lines of companies due to the current conditions of the market. However he also believs that this is the time companies need to keep their customers satisfied so as to hold on to their market share. “It is this balancing act between maintaining a healthy bottomline while not compromising on customer satisfaction will continue to drive companies to outsource and offshore,” he says.

Outsourcing as a concept is here to stay believes Kumar. The only change that will take place, and is already happening, is in the type and the complexity of the processes that are being outsourced. Amen to that!