Hewlett-Packard Co.'s $13.9 billion deal for Electronic Data Systems Corp. catapulted business processing outsourcing back into the spotlight. A big driver behind the deal is HP's desire to take on industry leader IBM Corp.
Competition for BPO contracts is stiff, with dozens of providers in the U.S. and abroad going head-to-head for the most lucrative deals. But there's an interesting trend in outsourcing that ratchets up the competition even further. And that is that global corporations are no longer routinely outsourcing all of their services to a single provider. Instead, companies are shopping for the best deals and are outsourcing slices of their business processes to different providers. Case in point: Bristol-Myers Squibb Co. on Thursday
awarded IBM a $324 million, 10-year contract to manage its human resources. That follows a $715 million, seven-year
deal Bristol-Myers signed with EDS in December to provide IT services.
Is this good or bad news for HP, EDS, IBM and the other global providers? It's hard to say. But it sure does open the playing field. -
Suzanne Stevens
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