Teleperformance aims to be Euro 10 bn by 2025; India to play key role

With India being one of the largest and most diverse centre for the company, its support in this growth will be crucial

France-listed BPM player Teleperformance has set itself a target of becoming a Euro 10 billion company by 2025. The company which has 80,000 of its headcount in India, is ensuring that the country continues to support this growth.

In terms of strategy the company is also pivoting from being just a voice-based BPM player. The shift is also a reflection of the changing nature of the customer base which is consisting more of millennials and new age customers who do not prefer too much voice interaction.

Three years back Teleperformance moved onto a road map of a blended model that begins with a mix of voice-based work, back office operations and financial accounting.

“This is a reflection of the customer base that we are catering to. They prefer email, chatbots and videos to resolve their issues. Going ahead we aspire to be 30 per cent voice, 30-40 per cent blended voice and back-office and then the balance as pure back-office. We also believe that voice will not go away completely, so we will want to have some voice capabilities. In the next 2-3 years we do see ourselves at this stage,” said Aditya Arora, CEO Teleperformance India.

When asked if voice services are still growing in India, Arora shared that the demand for voice is based on industry verticals. “In a retail environment like Amazon or Flipkart the voice component could be just about 20 per cent, but in insurance and banking where people still need to interact with an expert is very high. Or the upcoming crypto industry there is a need for both voice and back office work,” he added.

What makes Teleperformance different from several BPM players is its India focus. Not only is India one of the largest geographies for servicing global clients, but India is a huge market as well. This is due to the acquisition of Intelenet, which had acquired Sparsh BPO, one of the largest players in the domestic market.

According to the company’s 2021 annual results, operations in India generated 439 million euros in revenue, up 11.1 per cent from the prior-year period on a like-for-like basis and up 7.7 per cent as reported. Arora highlights that all leading banks, retailers and also large startups are its clients.

Arora is confident that he can grow the India business to a double digit growth. “We have been able to have above average industry growth in India is because we are very focused, we have the right pricing strategy and bring in practices from our international business units into domestic market.”

He further added: “Our value proposition is that we do not differentiate between international and domestic business. Moreover, the people who manage international accounts are also working with Indian players.”

Arora shares that this model of growing the Indian domestic business profitably as well as running the international operations from India has become a sought after model within the company and is also getting replicated in other geographies.

To match this growth, the company is also ramping up its hiring plans. During the pandemic the company launched TP Cloud Campus which allowed them to reach out to 54-55 cities in India to recruit from. We want to create a sustainable eco-system that allows us to leverage the TP Cloud Campus platform as well as the ability to hire from smaller cities.

“We are launching TP Shuttle, which is a customized bus that has been created like a recruitment lounge. The idea is to close out the offer while we are on the bus. We are also tapping into areas that have not been tapped before, so we will begin this from North East India,” added Arora.

The recruitment will begin from April of this year and to begin with will hire 1,000 people and will slowly take this number up to 5,000. Arora also stated that these recruits will have the option to choose to work from home or from office. The company closed the year 2021 with a total headcount of 420,000.