[October 20, 2010] Aegis acquires Argentinian BPO with 5,000 employees Tweet Oct 20, 2010 (Mint - McClatchy-Tribune Information Services via COMTEX) -- Aegis Ltd, the outsourcing arm of Essar Group, has acquired Actionline, a business process outsourcing firm (BPO) in Argentina for an undisclosed sum, marking the entry into the Latin American market of a back-office services firm that has a clear strategy of establishing a global presence through acquisitions. The acquisition, the 16th by Aegis, will add 5,000 employees and 14 clients to the company. Actionline offers traditional contact centre services as well as data base management services. "Actionline fills a key void in Aegis' geographical and services portfolio," said Aegis chief executive Aparup Sengupta. The acquisition was funded for through internal sources, Sengupta added. The $15 billion ('66815 crore)-by-revenue Essar Group has in the past also helped Aegis fund acquisitions. Before the acquisition, Aegis had about 40,000 employees, and revenue of about $700 million. Aegis has a stated policy of aggressively expanding through acquisitions, and is targeting revenue of $1 billion by 2012. According to Sandip Sen, president, Americas, and chief marketing officer of Aegis, Actionline is "profitable" and has been registering a compounded annual growth rate of about 65% between 2003 and 2009. A company statement on Tuesday said the Argentinian BPO is "spread across seven centres in five cities" and is "domestic market-focused, serving leading telecom, banking, insurance and energy clients in the region." Actionline's operations in two other Latin American countries, Chile and Brazil, are not part of the transaction. "Actionline will mark our beachhead in Latin America, a fast growing market with a strong domestic demand," Sen said. "With one-three hours time difference with New York and two-four hours with major European cities, Argentina is in a very favourable time zone. Its multi-lingual workforce can be effectively tapped for not only the US, but also non-English speaking markets in Europe, which is Aegis' next frontier." In May, Aegis had acquired 59.13% stake in Bombay Stock Exchange (BSE)-listed AGC Networks Ltd for a little over '200crore. About 500 employees of AGC, an enterprise network services firm, had joined Aegis. The company also picked up a further 20% in AGC through an open offer, as required under Indian laws. The back office firm, which had earlier looked at getting listed on stock exchanges through an initial public offering has since shelved those plans. Its chief executive Sengupta said in September that a reverse merger with the listed AGC is also an option. "Given its footprint in the US, it makes sense for the company to have near-shore presence in Latin America, to better serve their clients in the North American market," said Arup Roy, senior research analyst at the Indian arm of Gartner Inc. "Besides, the domestic market opportunity in Latin American itself is big." Aegis currently has centres in the US, the Philippines, Costa Rica, Kenya, Sri Lanka, Australia, New Zeland and South Africa. To see more of Mint, or to subscribe to the newspaper, go to http://www.livemint.com. Copyright (c) 2010, Mint, New Delhi Distributed by McClatchy-Tribune Information Services. For more information about the content services offered by McClatchy-Tribune Information Services (MCT), visit www.mctinfoservices.com, e-mail [email protected], or call 866-280-5210 (outside the United States, call +1 312-222-4544). [ Back To TMCnet.com's Homepage ]