In what is seen as a first-of-its-kind acqusition in the Indian BPO industry, UK-based Serco Group has acquired the Gurgaon-based BPO major Infovision, published media reports have said.

This is the first deal signed by the 6-billion USD Serco Group in India and marks the entry of this business services company into the country considered as the home to global outsourcing.

A report in the Economic Times said the Serco had acquired a 60 per cent stake in Infovision and would take over the rest in the next couple of years. The UK major reportedly paid 75 million USD for Infovision which is valued at around Rs.250 crore in the domestic market.

Infovision, which has a staff strength of over 10,000 people working for 60 clients, is the first BPO acquisition for Serco that offers a full range of support services to its clients. Economic Times reports that post-acquisition, the company plans to double its workforce over the next two-three years.

The newspaper report said that formal announcements of the acquisition is expected only three weeks from now and adds that the buyout provides Serco a toe-hold in the country at a time when the domestic BPO market is estimated to grow from 1.8 billon USD to about 10 billion by tye year 2012.

This is the first time an Indian BPO company has been bought over by a big player from overseas whereas in the past deals like the TCS buyout of Citigroup Global Services and WNS Holdings picking up Aviva Global Services represented captives of MNCs being bought over by Indian companies.

InfoVision operates from 24 locations across 16 cities in India. Its clients include Deutsche Bank, HSBC, American Express, Aviva, Max New York Life and FMCG players like Whirlpool, says the newspaper report.