October 6 (SeeNews) - Southeastern Europe will remain a high-growth region for the outsourcing industry over the next five years, despite uncertainty in the sector related to the UK's decision to leave the EU, the CEO of the Global Sourcing Association (GSA) said on Thursday.
"It (the outsourcing industry in the SEE region) is nearshore and it is a big drive that it has a blended outsourcing portfolio.[...] The region is in a really strong place," Kerry Hallard, CEO of GSA told SeeNews on the sidelines of the European Leadership Summit in Sofia.
Personal and language skills of the employees in the region are exceptional, Hallard added.
"The drawback, maybe, is sustainability and for a country like Bulgaria how quickly it can have the right skills and talent readily available, which might be an issue," Hallard noted.
In a comment about the launch of the new Global Sourcing Standard by the GSA, Hallard said she expects that outsourcing companies operating in the region will embrace the new standards as they will receive many benefits. Also, the standard will be a sort of insurance policy in the heavy regulated industry in which they are operating.
Bulgarian president Rossen Plevneliev said at summit that the Bulgarian outsourcing sector generated 1.4 billion euro ($1.57 million) in revenues in 2015, representing 3.4% of the country's GDP for the year. The share is expected to grow to 6% of GDP in 2020, Plevneliev added.
Currently, the outsourcing sector in Bulgaria employs 42,000. The number is projected to rise to 64,000 by 2020.
($ = 0.8938 euro)