Atento’s Latin American footprint is already vast, but its new CEO is bullish about expanding that even further. market may be attractive for Atento, but its domestic growth in Latin America has always taken precedence. Sign up for our Nearshore Americas newsletter: “Innovation and technology don’t happen where you expect, so we want to focus our labs and innovation centers on detecting innovation across our geographies, in other industries, and across the customer base,” said López-Abadía. The plan is to export these capabilities to multiple locations, which could strengthen Atento’s efforts to penetrate the U.S. He claims that the company is running one of the largest robotics projects in this industry, as well as using AI analytics technologies to double sales for some clients.
His hope is that Atento can now communicate the benefits of that to the U.S. Technology and innovation found in the Nearshore region when he joined the company. clients pay double that-from Atento’s point of view, that’s why the market is so attractive.”ĭespite the company’s historic efforts to take aim at the U.S., López-Abadía considers the Nearshore industry as an important, fast-growing sector for the company, primarily due to the attractiveness of the world’s largest market.Ĭoming from a technology background, López-Abadía was pleasantly surprised by the “Domestic clients pay around $7-8 per hour, per seat, while U.S.
“After the company went public, it pushed investment into legacy sites that were designed to draw local market clients,” our source revealed, highlighting that there wasn’t much left in the coffers to focus on attacking the U.S. soil, the high standard that clients expect make BPO a capital intensive business for Nearshore vendors, and, with Atento’s stock dropping from $15 to $3 since going public in 2014, capital is running short. López-Abadía is aware of this perception and is actively trying to change it, starting with the recruitment of a new head of sales for the country.Įven if this new recruit can generate business on U.S. clients, who expect high standards of English capabilities and high-quality call centers. The company’s European, Spanish-speaking heritage can be off-putting for some U.S. “After 10 or 12 years of barking up the same tree, this is like Groundhog Day for the fourth or fifth time.” “Without serious long-term investment and a much higher focus on English speakers at the executive and managerial levels, Atento is unlikely to become a formidable force in the United States,” the source said. The issue, according to a source who spoke to Nearshore Americas anonymously, was a complete lack of English-speaking managers in Atento’s Latin American sites. customers, so what caused that momentum to slow down? Today, only a handful of the company’s 150,000 agents are serving U.S. standards, highlighting efforts to reinforce its managerial teams and regulatory compliance in Nearshore locations to achieve that goal.Īt that time, the company was making good strides towards its objective, serving companies like AT&T and Motorola, which allowed it to quickly fill new centers to capacity in El Salvador and Guatemala. In 2014, the provider told Nearshore Americas about its strategy to meet U.S.
This isn’t the first time the company has been vocal about its plans to make a splash in the U.S. may prove successful but based on previous attempts to gain a foothold, it’s likely this will be a long-term endeavor. If these strategies pay off then Atento’s next stab at the U.S. “The question now is how we increase the attractiveness of our Nearshore offerings and general go-to-market strategy in the region.” “The US might be one of the few places where I would consider a potential acquisition to speed up growth in the market,” says López-Abadía. market and adding new capabilities through acquisitions. ” Atento CEO, Carlos López-AbadiaĪlthough there is nothing specific on the table right now, the company is continuously looking at bolstering its presence in the U.S. and making operational improvements to centers where we are likely to expand our coverage of the market, such as Colombia, Central America, and Mexico. “We are reinforcing our sales team in the U.S. “Atento hasn’t paid enough attention to the US market in the past, so I intend to change that and turn it into a larger area of expansion for us,” the company’s new CEO, Carlos López-Abadía, tells Nearshore Americas. For Spanish contact center giant Atento, dominance in Spanish-speaking markets has come naturally – but gaining market share in the United States has been an entirely different game.
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