Ingram Micro Selects Offshoring Provider

The Santa Ana, Calif.-based distributor selected Bangalore, India-based Progeon to handle some of its financing, customer service, vendor management, inside sales and technical support, said Ingram Micro President Greg Spierkel.

"The key thing is they are one of the largest outsourcing providers in the world. They have more depth and more expertise than anyone else," Spierkel said. Most of the duties being sent overseas include claims management and program tracking. "They are operations that involve a huge volume of administrative work that we had in house," Spierkel said.

Several solution providers have approached Ingram Micro about leveraging the distributor to use Progeon to outsource some of their back-office operations, Spierkel said. Ingram Micro has no specific plans to start such an initiative, but the distributor collected the names and may explore the idea. "We want to get ourselves up and running before we go down that road," he said.

Daly Computers, a Clarksburg, Md.-based solution provider, provides a 24-hour help desk for some clients, but it would not be interested in utilizing Progeon through Ingram Micro, said Ray Morton, director of technical services. "I've spoken with a couple offshore companies that provide support in India, mainly for programming. But for customer-facing activity, I don't think so. The language barrier [is] difficult," Morton said.

Morton added that he did not expect Ingram Micro's outsourcing to affect his business. "If anything, if Ingram can save money to do other initiatives, that's all good," he said.

The inside sales support teams being offshored handle less than 3 percent of Ingram Micro's sales and represent its smallest customers that receive pool-based support, Spierkel said. The majority of Ingram Micro customers, including those that have dedicated sales reps, should not be affected, he said.

STEVEN BURKE contributed to this article.