Philippines could lose 1 million BPO jobs in 2025: analyst

MANILA, PHILIPPINES — The Philippine Business Process Outsourcing (BPO) industry is projected to shed over one million jobs over the next two years due to automation and offshoring of lower-value work, according to global investment banker Stephen Cuunjieng.
In an interview on ANC’s Market Edge, Cuunjieng warned of an “extreme slowdown in BPO employment” in the Philippines. He cited intelligent projections that the country could “lose over a million of those jobs in the next twelve to twenty-four months.”
The driving factors behind this crisis are increased automation — especially in lower-value BPO services — and the trend of concentrating work in low-end segments rather than high-value services.
Cuunjieng explained that as BPO revenues and profits decline globally, employment cuts will soon follow.
Major publicly-listed BPO companies in the United States have reported falling revenues and profits over the past year. Without business growth to offset efficiency gains from automation, Cuunjieng foresees massive layoffs.
This looming crisis threatens the cornerstone of growth for the Philippine economy. Proactive policies and private-sector initiatives to retrain workers and move the industry up the value chain will ensure that the Philippine BPO sector has a bright future.