Continuing its acquisition spree, Essar group firm Aegis on Tuesday forayed into Argentina by taking over business process outsourcing (BPO) company Actionline, with estimated revenues of over $50 million annually.
This is the 16th acquisition for Aegis over the last five years. The company is part of the $15-billion Essar Group.
"We have entered into an agreement with Young and Rubicam Argentina and their local partner to fully acquire their jointly held BPO company Actionline in Argentina," Aegis said in a statement.
With workforce of 5,000 that Actionline has, Aegis' total headcount goes up to 47,000. The company has a target of 50,000 workforce and is looking to expand its footprint in various markets, including America, Latin America, Africa and West Asia.
Aegis is a leading outsourcing service partner in the world, with more than 135 clients, and over two decades of leadership in total customer lifecycle management.
Actionline, on the other hand, is one of the largest BPOs in Argentina, spread across seven centres in five cities. It is focused on domestic business, serving leading telecom, banking, insurance, and energy clients in the region.
It brings to Aegis 12 clients in different categories, adding to the Essar Group firm's strong base of over 135 customer base in different parts of the world.
Founded in 1994, Actionline has expanded at a healthy pace, registering a compounded annual growth rate of 65 per cent from 2003-2009.
"We are very happy to have found an able partner in Actionline to expand our footprint in Latin America. Actionline fits beautifully in our vision of tapping the large domestic outsourcing market and it brings with it a very talented workforce, a strong knowledge base, and deep customer partnership. It fills a key void in Aegis' geographical and services portfolio and we warmly welcome Actionline's management, employees, clients and other stakeholders into the 40,000 strong Aegis global family," Aegis' MD and Global CEO Aparup Sengupta said.
Asked whether the company still had an appetite for more acquisitions, Sengupta said: "Yes. We have to consolidate our current businesses and we shall continue to look for suitable opportunities in markets like Europe."
"Actionline will mark our beachhead in Latin America, a fast growing market with a strong domestic demand. With 1-3 hour time difference with New York and 2-4 hours between major European cities, Argentina has a very favourable time zone," said Sandip Sen, President (Americas and Global) and Chief Marketing Officer.
Actionline Argentina's senior management, lead by CEO Fernando Pedron, will continue to spearhead the business.
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