Philippine BPO must adopt agentic AI by 2027, Mindsprint says
- Mindsprint says Philippine BPO must adopt specialized agentic AI platforms by 2027.
- The Philippine IT-BPM industry is valued at $40 billion to $42 billion.
- Mindsprint says the industry association cut revenue targets by 15% to 27%.
- The CEO urges workers to deepen domain expertise to stay relevant.
MANILA, PHILIPPINES — The chief executive of digital transformation company Mindsprint is urging the Philippine outsourcing industry to adopt specialized artificial intelligence (AI) agent platforms by 2027 to protect its position as a global information technology and business process management (IT-BPM) hub.
Mindsprint said workers will need deep domain expertise, not routine execution, to stay relevant as AI changes how outsourced work is priced and delivered.
From headcount to outcomes
The IT-BPM industry, valued at $40 billion to $42 billion, is the second-largest business process outsourcing (BPO) hub after India, BusinessWorld reported.
Mindsprint said the sector faces growing pressure, with the industry association revising revenue targets down by 15% to 27%.
“The opportunity lies in building specialized platforms and solutions that fundamentally transform the BPO model, shifting … to an outcome-based one,” said Mindsprint CEO Suresh Sundararajan.
He said success by 2027 would mean Philippine providers offering sector-specific services in areas such as banking, insurance, health sciences and telecom, delivered through AI agents and priced on outcomes or consumption rather than headcount.
Scaling outsourced workflows has traditionally meant adding staff in line with volume, such as deploying 100 workers to process one million invoices.
Sundararajan said customer talks now center on invoice volumes and cost per invoice rather than the number of people deployed.
Workers urged to move up the value chain
Sundararajan outlined four focus areas for Philippine talent: deepening domain expertise, moving from execution to strategic partnership, strengthening customer-facing engagement and broadening technical skills.
He cited Microsoft’s Work Trend Index, which found 25% of Philippine workers qualify as “frontier professionals,” against a global average of 16%.
The Oxford Government AI Readiness Index ranks the Philippines 56th out of 69 countries, which Sundararajan described as a “high-usage, low-readiness environment.”
He said companies should tie AI deployment decisions to their existing cybersecurity frameworks and keep human oversight for mission-critical operations.
“Assuring employees that this isn’t about eliminating jobs, but about enabling them to take on new roles with the company’s support, is a critical factor in overcoming resistance and building genuine trust in AI adoption,” he said.
For buyers, a shift to agentic AI changes what to ask of a business process outsourcing (BPO) partner, from seat counts to output, accuracy and cost per transaction.
Firms comparing providers on the top 40 BPO companies in the Philippines list can ask which services are already priced on outcomes and how staff are being retrained.
Related news
- Philippine IT-BPM needs a talent push to hit $50.5Bn by 2028 · 29 Sep
- Tax perks not enough to save Philippines BPO: WTO · 21 Sep
- Philippine BPO calls AI threat real but manageable · 27 Aug
Disclosure: Outsource Accelerator uses AI tools in the backend of its editorial workflow. Every article is reviewed and verified by a human editor before publication.
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