Jules Rumsey (Cloud Plus)
Brisbane-based Cloud Plus has launched an overseas outsourcing service for partners after witnessing a decline in resources and work ethic in Australia.
The private cloud provider has hired 10 people in the Philippines capital Manilla to handle largely technical support for the professional services provider Insentra.
Cloud Plus has outsourced some of its own operations to Manila for the last four years. Company founder and CEO Jules Rumsey told ARN he began to see a “serious amount of interest” from partners who encountered his own offshore team.
“There is a pipeline of opportunity, so we think it’s going to explode,” he said. “We have actively started talking to partners and have already taken additional space in the building. We have dibs on more space just so we have a pipeline of available space.”
According to Cloud Plus’ website, the outsource service will save partners more than 50 per cent of the costs in Australia. Pricing is based on a flat monthly fee with Cloud Plus claiming to be “flexible” in what it can offer partners from Manila.
Addressing a room at the Cloud Plus Partner Plus Roadshow in Sydney, Rumsey also claimed the operation would help partners struggling to recruit skilled workers in Australia.
“If your experience was like ours, we were finding it really hard to hire for service roles in Australia. There is not enough newly-trained resources coming through. The work ethic isn’t what there was historically, whereas we found in Manila there was a really strong one.
“The culture there is different. There is a very family-orientated culture there and the lack of social services means many are looking after family members. That seems to generate a lot of maturity,” Rumsey added.
“Telstra has 16,000 people there now. Optus has up to 8,000 people, while TPG has thousands. There is a large pool of resources there that we can leverage.”
Outsourcing is often a difficult conversation point for the IT community. Telstra’s recent decision to open another outsourcing operation in Bangalore landed it in hot water with the CEPU Communications Union, which accused CEO Andy Penn of treating workers with “complete disrespect”.
However, many Australian-based providers, such as Seccom Global and Oreta, have recently turned to markets such as India and the Philippines in an effort both lower costs and provide round-the-clock customer service.
