The characteristics that make BPO work easy to offshore, like its repetitiveness, also make it suitable for automation. Outsourced jobs in India and the Philippines are already changing as AI becomes part of the workflow. And workers are feeling it.
Ponce’s company, for example, has an AI assistant for its clients. “If AI can help them, the issue gets resolved right away, instead of … being transferred to a live agent, leaving us with no tasks to work on,” he said.
“I’ve heard from the news and other BPO friends that some people have lost their jobs, … especially those in chat support.”
In Bengaluru, AI is disrupting another commonly outsourced task: coding. As the CEO of Emergent Labs, an app-building platform that lets anyone use AI to write code, Mukund Jha is helping to drive the change.
“The whole outsourcing industry will need to be reimagined,” said the startup co-founder. He sees a “massive risk” of 2 million to 3 million people facing disruption.
“Earlier, … software development was really expensive. It used to take a lot of time, and you’d outsource it to India … at a cheaper cost. But what’s happening with AI now is that anybody can build.”
Is the concern about job losses just fearmongering or has an AI job apocalypse begun in the world’s outsourcing capitals, CNA’s Insight explores.
WATCH: Outsourcing jobs in India and Philippines are changing — and workers are feeling it (46:04)
