Much ado about nothing – Facebook is starting a support office in Hyd.and I do not understand why Indian blogosphere has taken that as a big news.
The support office will be the same as what Google Adwords team does in India – i.e. backend support [advertisers/sales] to US HQ.
While this may sound BIG News to a lot, this is just another BPO story [as good as saying BT starting support center in India, its just that BT isn’t as cool brand as Facebook].
Its sad that India’s BPO story still wins over the technology story [I’d anyday prefer Zynga outsourcing engineering to India than Facebook outsourcing support] and to top it all, people are actually taking this as a great piece of news.
For Facebook, its just another way to grab cheap labor in the times when economy is improving and they need to start at ‘cheaper’ locations.
Maybe Facebook will start its engineering office later – so if you are a startup, gear up for more hiring blues (Startup Hiring in the Face of Receding Recession). But till then, enjoy the BPO goodies [and support from Facebook India].
Recommended Read: Facebook Beats Orkut in India [Search Trends]
Bang on Ashish! It is indeed nothing to get excited about and is a classic example of why we should take news reported with a pinch of salt(though I prefer chat masala
).
Love the move, this shows the quality of people available in Hyderabad and also the success of Hyderabad in accommodating as ‘The Best’ outsourcing destination in Asia if not the world.
This comes out to be a good news for India as Google already have their office here and now Facebook.
India is become apple of eye for IT sector.. Cheers Facebook
@Harsh …Really? You don’t know even little bit about IT sector then… FB coming to India with a backend operation is as bad as India becoming a complete BPO of the world. It is a sad news
Agreed. This is because the media is in awe of such Internet darlings and anything linked with India becomes good news.
On the other hand,I think FB is testing the Indian waters with its back end support setup maybe coz it is more established practice in India? They will eventually move to mainstream engineering just because of the customization required for the Indian/Asian market. Plus, with 70 percent of FB users outside US, where else can they go
India is slowly being eyed as the central hub of IT by the US. They are branching out due to the evidence of strong IT industry in India. Let’s see how this goes in the following years.
by this FB so many people get employeement .
I’m guessing Facebook has not matured enough to outsource engineering operations anywhere. To outsource, the company itself needs to have solid processes. May be Facebook is still working on it.
We should remember Google opened its dev center in Bangalore(after opening in Israel and Japan) before opening Adwords support in Hyderabad.
India’s excellence in innovation should not be judged by how many dev centers get outsourced here. Instead, we should see how many Facebooks, Twitters etc are born out of India. Sadly we don’t fare that well in this area.
Agree with you.. it not more than a usual BPO operation. Don’t think its that big news
These days everything is news. Of the rubbish that masquerades as news, this is one of the better ones. Would you rather read about ratan tata selling his soul to the devil (namo) for his nano?
Outsourcing should nevr be big news actually. It’s always been there in India. Manufacturers have always been outsourcing parts to other people. Dozens of auto outsourcing firms thrive in Pune thanks to tata, Bajaj etc. Citibank, Stanchart, Maxtouch & now ICICI & Airtel always outsourced their sales functions to DSA’s. Catering is an example of outsourcing too. As is transportation.
The reason BPO & It are big stories is because they’re creating jobs in India & putting India on the World map repeatedly.
After all China is known for it’s manufacturing outsourcing prowess. Do we marvel at their growth or do we laugh it off as cheap goods?
Anyway, even in our big software stories, we’re not doing much. Most of it is software maintenance, not development, some tech support.
Are we calling that low end work? What happened to dignity of labour? Are we trying to incorporate the varna system in our very equal IT/ITES world?
Just a support office, I thought it was Developing operations in it too. Anyway good for us.
Really agreeable post about India’s BPO wins over Technology.
Love the move, this shows the quality of people available in Hyderabad and also the success of Hyderabad in accommodating as ‘The Best’ outsourcing destination in Asia if not the world.
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Oh please….any kind of an investment is currently welcome in India…..we need to get max people employed….We need our per capita income to go up…so that our savings increase…our investments increase and we can become more financially safe so that we can become more risk lovers than risk averse people…this basically will gives us the strength to think out of the box without thinking of the consequences so much….. Also, FB office in Hyderabad is creating jobs for people who have done MA/BA/BSC/Bcom….and working in FB gives such people a great opportunity to prove their mettle….and I think India needs this desperately because our country STILL does not give the opportunity for people to think out of the box…I for one absolutely welcome and love the idea of a company like Facebook in India….whatever kind of work they may bring in…….
Just because our country desperately needs clothes doesn’t mean that we import banana leaves to help us think “out of the box”.
Your last line captures the state of mind: “whatever kind of work they may bring in.”
- Arvind