Source: Featured Blogs - Forrester
Business process outsourcing competed historically on wage differentials and standardized workflows—a model predicated on human labor remaining the cheapest variable in routine work. AI automation inverts that equation: geography and headcount become irrelevant, forcing BPO vendors to compete on speed, quality, and specialized knowledge work instead. Margins collapse for companies built on pure cost arbitrage. Legacy BPO players either reinvent as outcome-focused service partners or lose market share to automation-native competitors who never operated on the labor arbitrage assumption.