Polaris BPO arm buys iBackoffice

MUMBAI: Polaris Software Lab Ltd said its recently established subsidiary Optimus Outsourcing Company Ltd has bought the assets of a local back-office services firm to boost its fledgling business process outsourcing (BPO) service.

Optimus was set up by the Madras-based banking and financial services provider Polaris in late July, as it joined the list of Indian software firms augmenting their services with back-office work like customer call management, transaction processing, accounting and payroll management.

The Polaris statement released late on Thursday did not indicate how much the company was paying for the assets of Bangalore-based iBackoffice, which is also a relatively new entrant into the services. Global Technology Ventures, which is backed by Bank of America Partners and Nomura International PLC, is iBackOffice's key investor, data from Web site www.ibackoffice.com shows.

"We have been looking at greenfield as well as inorganic growth strategies to launch our BPO initiative and this is a small beginning," the statement quoted Harpal Duggal, chief executive of Optimus as saying. "This will give us a headstart in the fast moving field of business process outsourcing."

iBackoffice has ready-to-use infrastructure and skilled staff and Optimus is eyeing its client base including contracts in the pipeline, though no details were given. Officials were not available for comment. Polaris shares were up 3.13 percent at Rs 189.35 in the morning at the Bombay Stock Exchange, off a high of Rs 192.80, while the benchmark exchange index was up 1.31 percent.

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