Although well known for Tea, Sri Lanka is not that known for IT. Still, Sri Lanka has its talented engineers developing many world-class software products and providing world-class BPM services across the globe. 

AT Kearney called the island nation “a hidden gem for outsourcing.” The IT-BPM sector is currently the fifth highest exporter of foreign exchange to the country. 

During their recent trip to Sri Lanka, Dr. Dishan Jayasinha, President and CEO of the Sri Lanka Foundation International USA, and his wife Zuigly Jayasinha visited some of the leading players in the Sri-Lankan IT-BPM industry. The visit was facilitated by SLASSCOM, the knowledge & innovation chamber for IT/BPM industries in Sri Lanka.

Some of the notable companies they visited were Info mate, Zone 24×7, Hatch, VeracityAI, BISTEC Global, and Loops Agency.

Infomate is a pioneer shared services center in Sri Lanka. It is a successful accounting BPO company that offers a range of services from end-to-end accounting, HR and payroll, data entry, image annotation, and diverse back office and admin tasks. 

Zone 24×7 is an IT services company specializing in offering end-to-end technology consulting and engineering services to technology startups to fortune 500 organizations. Their services include enterprise software applications, big data & data science engineering, embedded systems engineering, remote monitoring & IoT, machine learning, cognitive vision, robotics, and innovation services with technology proof of concept development.

Hatch is a co-working space, startup incubator, and accelerator that was recently awarded ‘The Best Co-Working Space in the World’ at the Global Startup Awards 2021. Hatch actively partners with several private sector organizations, Sri Lanka’s public sector, and international agencies to incubate and accelerate the growth of the Sri Lankan startups and is now working with regional ecosystems to nurture talent and create market opportunities. VeracityAI is a data sciences services company that provides professional services, product design and developments, and prototyping solutions in the areas of Data Science, AI, and Machine Learning, including deep learning. It is now one of Australia and Norway’s best data science services companies. 

BISTEC Global is an IT-BPM company that enables businesses to expand their products or services through the power of the global talent pool. BISTEC offers five blueprint services to enable full potential value to clients via extended teams located in Sri Lanka: Accounting BPO services, IT services, Software development services, Business consultancy, and Digital marketing services. BISTEC focuses on Australia, UK & USA as its main markets and has already established customers in each market.

Loops Agency is a leading digital marketing agency that offers digital marketing services, Integrated Creative Solutions, IT Development, and Video Animation and Filming services. 

“I am amazed by the work these companies are doing and pleasantly surprised by the talent on offer.” Dr. Dishan Jayasinha 

Sri Lanka’s IT-BPM sector offers services to many leading players in the global market, including Fortune 500 companies. Many global companies have extended teams based in Sri Lanka. Sri Lanka stands out in the competitive South Asian market for outsourcing because of its highly skilled talent. The island has one of the highest literacy rates in the region. Over 130,000 are employed in the IT-BPM sector and are highly skilled and adaptable. The workforce grows at over 20% year on year and has very low attrition rates ranging from 10-15%. Over 300 IT and BPM companies operate in Sri Lanka. These range from tech startups and small to medium-scale businesses to large global companies. Some of the top global IT-BPM companies in Sri Lanka are Accenture, HSBC, London Stock Exchange Global Services, Microsoft, Industrial & Financial Systems (IFS), RR Donnelley, Virtusa, Millennium Information Technology, and Innodata Isogen. 

Dr. Dishan was highly impressed with the range of services and creative talent in the industry and the areas of technology and knowledge services that they have explored. He noted that more opportunities should be created for companies in this space and is looking forward to working with the talent in Sri Lanka.