Because business class tickets are way overpriced compared to actual airline costs for those seats, (just look at the businees class only airlines) I don’t have any bonus miles to use. For example some travel agencies have special businessclass/upgrade deals sometimes.

Some other tourist destinations in Malaysia such as Langkawi, Genting and Cameron Highlands show flying colors of Asian culture and history. On the other hand, situated at the confluence of Sungai Gombak and Sungai Klang River, Kuala Lumpur is a commercial and business center of Malaysia and forms troika with Singapore and Bangkok as the most glamorous cities in East Asia. Tourist attractions in Kuala Lumpur such as Aquaria KLCC, the Batu Caves, the Makam Pahlawan, the National Science Centre, Petaling Street, the Royal Selangor Pewter Visitor Centre, the Zoo Negara (National Zoo), etc.

Kuala Lumpur is the capital and largest city of Malaysia spreading in an area of 244 km2 (94 sq mi) has as an estimated population of 1.6 million. Kuala Lumpur and its surrounding urban areas form the most industrialized and economically, the fastest growing region in Malaysia. Multifarious job opportunities in Kuala Lumpur make it a popular destination for unemployed youth living in villages. Today, Kuala Lumpur provides job opportunities to youth and has become a city of hope.

Hotels in Malaysia such as Hotel Capitol, Cititel Mid Valley, Crown Regency, Hotel Furama Kuala Lumpur, Grand Centerpoint, Grand Continental, Hotel Grand Olympic, Hotel Radius International, Hotel Stanford, Hotel Suitestay, Hotel Swiss Inn, and many others are known globally among travelers for offering fantastic range of accommodation facilities and amenities. Advanced modern technology is used to facilitate tourists for purposes of conferencing and meeting.

British colonizers built numerous architectural landmark buildings, and the same influence could be seen in various other structures  in Kuala Lumpur which are blend of old colonial influences, Asian traditions, Malay Islamic inspirations, modern, and postmodern architecture mix. Whereas, Petronas Twin Towers are modern wonder of architecture, Victoria Institution is a British made wonderful architectural piece. Spreading across the horizon, Petronas building is a major tourist attraction in Kuala Lumpur.

Kuala Lumpur Hotels such as Hotel Equatorial, Hotel Maya, Impiana KLCC Hotel & Spa, Istana Hotel, Alpha Genesis Hotel, Ancasa Hotel, Ascott Kuala, Best Western Premier Seri Pacific Hotel, Brisdale Hotel, etc. offer standard accommodation facilities to travelers at attractive tariff. Hotels Kuala Lumpur known to offering facilities such as round the clock room service, airport pick & drop, bar, restaurant, swimming pool, spa, gym, conferencing facilities, internet, and many others.

Hotels In Kuala Lumpur namely Capitol Hotel, Carcosa Seri Negara Hotel, Citin Hotel, Cititel Express Hotel, Cititel Mid Valley Hotel, Citrus Hotel, Concorde Hotel, Concorde Inn, Coronade Hotel, Corus Hotel, D’oriental Inn, Dorsett Regency Hotel, Dynasty Hotel, Federal Hotel, Grand Millennium, Grand Seasons Hotel, Holiday Inn Glenmarie, are amongst the most sought among travelers. Kuala Lumpur is one of the most popular honeymoon destination among newly married couples.

Apart from the rate cut, Central Bankers pumped in huge money ($350 billion) into the system to temporarily tackle and contain the credit crunch thus providing more liquidity to the capital markets. ‘Escape from Sub prime’ has been one of the most sought after policy of some major lenders, bankers and NBFC’s who have substantial

exposure to the US subprime market collapse. It is on this context that analysts as well as the

policy makers have been much worried about an US economic slowdown, since housing market collapse in the US might lead to a full blown economic downturn due to co-related consumer expenditures. More housing starts and home sales mean more household goods per capita consumption, more people buying household appliances, accessories and others. While less credit in the system spells doom both for the auto industry which thrives on car loans based on easy credits as well as home loan originations that boost the housing and real estate markets.

Investors, anticipating US market trouble have sought shelter elsewhere where they have been parking their money in the Emerging Markets that has been consistently showing remarkable and sustained growth prospect. Though the market shake-off due to the US impact did pull down the emerging equity markets, the strong export driven fast paced developing nations are in-fact in their finest economic tunes since the last Asian Financial crisis in 1997.Quite equally the remarkable economic expansion and financial reforms undertaken by two of the world’s most fastest developing nations-China and India boasting 8-10% on average GDP growth rate.

Analysts feel much of the ill-effects due to the subprime crisis could be well cushioned by emerging Asian nations. Consumer demand and

expenditure are quite high on account of the newfound wealth in these countries, with the others joining the bandwagon, particularly Russia, Brazil, South Africa, India, China

(BRICS), Hong Kong, South Korea and Taipei . The other Asian countries like Thailand, Malaysia, Singapore and Indonesia, (ASEAN) nations have been performing well within their macroeconomic parameters.

Analyst might have had a view that the growing Asian economy might buffer any major US downturn, but since US still remains the major importer from these countries, and being the world’s largest economy (US$13.5 trillion), followed by Japan (US$4.5 trillion) which has been into a ‘deflationary stagflation’ phase since the late 90’s, concerns about export slowdown to these major partners lingering amongst the market participants. A further credit market tightening could jeopardize the corporate mega deals and stall major expansion programs. Fund raising may be hit hard if investor sentiments are towed down with increased risk aversion.

Few investors would like to lose money and in-fact is likely to seek better investment returns when the markets are performing well. Foreign investments into equity markets have increased considerably in the emerging markets where good corporate growth and higher returns are attracting global investors pouring liquidity into the stock markets. These factors have created in-effect, asset price rise and stock market bubbles in several countries like China and India. Markets are reacting to any global clues, either from the Fed, major Central Banks or the political changes affecting monetary and economic policies of such countries.

On the global currency frontier, continued weakening of the US dollar against the major traded currencies like euro, pound, Canadian dollar and the yen has been creating much debate among currency strategists whether to let the US dollar find its own ground or to mediate. Analysts, according to Bloomberg, also have a view that if the ‘Greenback’ is allowed to fall too rapidly then investors would dumb the dollar backed assets. In-fact the dollar has depreciated much to the extent of 10% against some currencies like the euro and the Indian Rupee, as recently noted by Asia-Pacific Head, Mark Mathews of Merrill Lynch. The emerging market currencies also appreciated considerably on account of huge capital inflows and the rise in demand for their domestic assets and currencies from overseas

investors.

With the ever increasing importance of Renminbi as a major Asian currency, the US dollar seems to have been taking a back seat. Though, it has been not so, according to currency strategists, since the US is still the largest market for investing, operating business and the biggest export market for the emerging economies.

Volatility in the global stock markets on the aftermath of the US subprime has increased since the housing market slowdown affected the mortgage backed bonds considerably. These bonds based on subprime loans, have been downgraded by S&P and Moody’s rating services since investors have been dumping these MBS bonds on fear of further losses. Many banks and financial institutions have bought these bonds as their portfolios to be traded on the stock markets across the board. When the borrowers started defaulting on their home loans, investors moved away from these bonds, reducing their demands among investors with mounting losses reported by major hedge funds houses and investment banks who own these bonds, thus accounting huge losses on these Asset Backed Securities (ABS).

The reports of these exposures, somewhat around USD 1 trillion brought down investor sentiments and in turn decreased the investors risk appetites. Stock markets across the globe reacted sharply whenever losses related to the subprime were reported, with markets crashing down wiping out substantial investor wealth (USD2.5 trillion) of the US equity market value. Elsewhere, markets have also tasted downturns along with some big rallies and bull runs, particularly in the emerging markets like India, China and Hong Kong ,Nikkie,etc. In fact, the Hang Seng has gained as much as it has lost since this month when it touched 31,000 point mark, before losing around 10% of its value within a month and now trading at 27,000 points.

The BSE (Sensex)of India has also been through biggest bull market rallies when it touched the 20,000 points for the first time. The China SCI 300 has been one such biggest stock market bubble as enormous capital is chasing the Shanghai stock exchange. The Hong Kong provides a big platform for raising capital and issuing IPO’s, as we have noticed some of the biggest IPO’s being issued here by China’s ICBC, CCB, PetroChina, Baidu.com,

Alibaba.com, etc. It seems corporate sectors in India and China are at there best times for issuing IPO’s. Recently PetroChina, according to Bloomberg.com, has become the world’s first company to reach a market capitalization of USD 1 trillion, and with this, being crowned as the largest listed company.

China has also been reported to have 106 billionaires, up from only 15 last year, according to Shanghai-based Hurun Report published in Bloomberg. India, having somewhat similar good story, has been reported to having three of the world’s top 10 richest individuals in the Forbes’s list.

In the Indian scenario, FII’s are bidding for IPO’s to get a pie of the bustling Indian capital markets. There has been much concern from the Sebi to counter the capital inflow into the equity markets via PN route, (an alternative route for unregistered investors to enter the capital markets). Policy makers are worried about too much money chasing too few stocks which might create stock market and asset price bubble. Inflation is well under control, around 3.5%, but there always remains the fear of an inflationary pressure due to the crude oil price shock- currently trading near $100 per barrel at the Nymex. It seems that oil has been moving the markets to some extent as concerns about supply constraint and Iran crisis looms high, and a supply cut from Mexican Gulf due to a hurricane has made the situation worst.

Recent oil price shock might cast a bad spell on the developing nations who import crude oil at such high price, and the accompanying inflation could push the prices of commodities still higher in those countries if effective monetary policy regime and economic reforms are not initiated. The currency collapse of Zimbabwe, where there

has been a situation of hyperinflation as prices are rising every other minute, reserves exhausted, shortage of essential commodities and lack of effective monetary policy has resulted in an alarming situation.

Whereas, some equity markets in the African subcontinent, according to clickafrique.com, giving attractive returns on investments in 2005- as high as 116% (Zambia) 81% (Uganda), investors see this as a major opportunity to foray into the untapped resources in Africa and bring in liquid

investments to mobilize those untapped resources.

Overall, the Asian emerging markets and their counterparts are doing well, lest the subprime crisis, where one has to look out for possible ways to tackle the failing mortgage bonds and the investment community’s exposure to such. Any cues from the US could affect the markets since equity markets today are have become much sensitive to any news or information’s flowing to the markets that are enough to tickle the market sentiments.

Sources: Bloomberg, Economic Times, Xinhua,Rueter

All call centers share the same basic fundamentals: business need, processes, people, technology and a place to house them all. By now, you will agree that there is market opportunity for outsourced call center services. However, to capture that opportunity, you must first build a call center.

Location

Though seeking a prime location for the business address is not critical, a secure and well-developed infrastructure is. The center should have stable electricity source, broadband connection, and convenient access to public transportation. Because you will be operating at hours when normal shops will be closed, a pantry stocked with basic food and drinks is a must.

Technology

No one should underestimate the impact good technology has on the delivery of service. In fact, technology plays a critical role in ensuring that every call is are efficiently processed, communication is monitored and the entire service-delivery procedure constantly improves.

The typical call center has a number of workstations that include a telephone set/headset connected to a telecom switch, and one or more supervisor stations. Inbound traffic is routed via Private Branch eXchange (PBX) and Automated Call Distribution systems. Predictive dialers automate call outs of potential customers and distribute the calls to available agents. A CRM solution is needed to track each lead (opportunity). As you increase the number of agents, you will require a workforce management solution to manage recruitment and staffing. Agent performance analytics can help keep agents aware of how they are performing and maximize compliance to client expectations.

Table 1: Technologies* available for Call Centers

Source: Enterprise Innovation 2006

Organization

The best run call centers maintain a lean organization. Outside of the executive manager, members who will contribute to the success of the call center include the agents, a team leader (1 per 10 agents), and IT manager (1 per 30 PCs). The call center is a people business and communications is the heart of it all. A top priority of management is to ensure that agents undergo regular training since competent and engaged agents are critical to building satisfied customers and successful campaigns. Like most other services, word of mouth will help bring in new business.

Breaking the investment bank

Call center owners have varying opinion on the right proportion of spending on different call center elements. A start-up call center business with five agents will have its investment budget allocated as follows: 20 percent on hardware and software, 10 percent on communications, 55 percent on people, 10 percent facilities, and 5 percent on business development. As the business matures, the people cost (including recruiting, training and compensation) will account for 65 percent of the business.

Revenue mix

Most small call centers start their business with one or two referrals. As expertise grows, the company will begin marketing itself through memberships in industry associations and chambers of commerce. Regular visits to the target market helps to break into new markets.

In Asia, call centers frequently run campaigns travel (special tour packages and time sharing facilities), financial services (insurance, mortgage and investments), consumer product sales (ranging from luxury goods to low-value and high volume products).

About 70 percent of the business comes from US, Europe and Australia. Domestic opportunities account for 20 percent and the remaining 10 percent is from regional clients.

Telemarketing (outbound calls) represents the greatest short-term opportunity for most call centers. Most campaigns are short-term (3-6 months) and payments are usually bi-weekly. Because these are sales transaction driven, the returns are faster compared to inbound contracts (a common type being helpdesk service provisioning) which are contracted at one to three years.

Moving forward

It is relatively easy to set up a call center. Start-up capital can be small provided you do your homework. Selecting the right technology from the start will ensure that you don’t waste time and resources identifying the right solution to use. Having good agents who are properly incentivized is important. Because it is a people business, you need to ensure that your agents and team leaders get regular training on best practices in customer engagements. It is a common-sense business.

As a manager and investor, put yourself in the shoes of the potential customer. If you like what you hear from the calling agent, chances are you will not mind continuing the engagement.

The financial rewards are real for those who make the effort on due diligence.

Consultants:

Ed Saldajeno, managing director, Alva Pacific Franchise Corp.

Juni Pama, country manager, Philippines, Five9

Paul Martin, director, Application Services, HP Services Asia Pacific

Tom Cheong, managing director, ASEAN, Avaya

Wilfred Tan, managing director, ASEAN, Genesys Telecommunications

Nigel Hewett, managing director, Asia, Witness Systems

What’s next?

In the next issue, we tackle the harsh reality of making your call center a business after the euphoria of the first campaign is over.

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