GERMAN information technology-business-process outsourcing (IT-BPO) companies remain keen in the Philippines as an outsourcing destination, with several planning firm expansion plans in the medium term, a Cabinet official said recently.
Trade Secretary Ramon M. Lopez said four German companies, three of which are existing players in the BPO industry expressed plans to expand in the Philippines.
Fresenius Medical Care’s shared services center in Alabang will increase its seat count from 77 to 130 by 2020. In terms of its medical-care operations, it will grow its 25 clinics to 37 also in three years’ time.
Pharmaceutial giant Boehringer Ingelheim (BI) will augment its worldwide service center network by building its third one in the Philippines to cater to the Asia-Pacific markets.
“BI has already been present in the Philippines for 50 years and is the third-largest multinational in the country. Currently, the company has two service locations located in Ingelheim [for the EU market] and Buenos Aires [South America Market],” Lopez said in a message to reporters. “The choice for Manila as the Asia-Pacific location was mainly because of the country’s good university system and access to talented work force.”
The company is slated to start operations in Manila this October. According to Lopez, BI will be hiring 200 employees to service Australia and New Zealand.
Pharmaceutical company Merck & Co., already with IT-BPO operations here, is planning to expand operations in three to four years’ time, Lopez said. He added Merck & Co. plans to increase its work force from the current 125 to 800 people by 2020.
The government official added that German auto firm BMW has tapped the Bosch Communications Center in the Philippines for inquiries from the Asean region.
According to 2016 trade statistics from the Philippine Statistics Authority, the European Union stands as the Philippines’s fourth-largest trading partner—taking a 9.7-percent share, or $13.713 billion, of the total trade for the year.
Among the EU countries, Germany is the country’s top trading partner with a share of $4.357 billion, or 31.8 percent, of EU’s total trade.
Export receipts to Germany amounted to $2.3 billion, while payments for imports were worth $2 billion or a trade surplus of $301.32 million.
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