Indian Outsourcing Hit Hard

The undersea communications cable break in the Mediterranean has had a huge effect on those Indian call centers.

Outsourcing has become a major bone of contention in a number of countries. You call for help or tech support and find yourself talking to someone in India. Well, for the moment your probablywon’t.   The undersea communications break that occurred near Egypt on Wednesday is having major repercussions. Not only has it disrupted Internet access to much of the Middle East andIndia, but the associated phone problems have hurt the call center business in India.   According to the BBC, about 50% of India’s bandwidth is down,and when you consider that outsourced business in the country, serving IT and other businesses, is worth $48 billion, that’s a major blow.   "The companies that serve the US eastcoast and the UK are worst affected," Rajesh Chharia, president of the Internet Service Providers’ Association of India, told AP. "The delay is very bad in some cases. They have to arrange back-up plans or they have to accept the poor quality for the time being until the fibre isrestored."   It could take up to a week for full service to be restored, experts say.