Smart ushers in concept of mobile call centers

Converting 40-foot container vans into mobile call centers at night is the latest project being pushed by Smart Communications to small- and medium-sized call center operators looking for speed of deployment without the huge capital investments needed when building premise-based call centers.

The mobile call centers will utilize the existing 19 Smart Click Internet Café and More vans deployed nationwide and managed by Smart’s Public Access Group. It’s like a time-sharing approach wherein the vans will serve as Internet cafés at daytime and morph into call centers at nighttime.

Smart has tapped Five9 Inc. to equip the vans with its on-demand call center solutions for customer interaction management. The two companies are currently doing proof-of-concept to make sure the right bandwidth is available to support a call center operation.

The Smart Click Internet Café and More can be franchised for P325,000. Each of the 40-foot airconditioned vans houses 15 computer terminals and peripherals, which would cost the franchisee over P20,000 in monthly amortization for three years.

Smart believes that turning the mobile Internet cafés into mobile call centers at night not only maximizes the use of these facilities on wheels but also guarantees more profits for Smart and its partners.

"Turning our Smart Click Internet Café and More branches into night-time call centers will help generate additional jobs in the provinces. We have the facilities needed – wireless broadband technology, PCs and strategic locations," says Tina Matriano, head of Smart’s Public Access Group.

As an infrastructure provider to the small- and medium-sized call centers, Smart Click offers high-speed Internet services via a dedicated connection providing speeds of up to 1MBps. This is the same bandwidth that typical Internet users who visit a Smart Click van get.

Five9, on the other hand, will serve as the application service provider, giving the operators not just the call center solution but also data hosting services at its headquarters in the United States.

"This Five9 partnership with Smart will allow us to bring the benefits of the call center industry to the countryside, and at the same time promote Filipino entrepreneurship," says Five9 country manager Junie Pama.

"It’s like a call center in a box that targets the moms and pops of the call center industry that need on-demand solutions and all the bandwidth they can use. We offer that and a location that can be moved to different locations," he adds.

Smart and Five9 have started pre-selling the mobile call center concept to local entrepreneurs and chambers of commerce.

The revenue-sharing scheme, Matriano says, is attractive at 90:10 for the first year, with the bigger share going to the franchisee and the rest to Smart.

Aside from Metro Manila, there are also four Smart Click Internet Café and More branches in Bulacan, two in Samar, two in Surigao, and in Batanes, Sorsogon, Antique, Cebu and Zamboanga.

To ensure a Smart Click’s profitability, Matriano says they consciously look for places with no or very limited Internet infrastructure as well as populated locations such as those near schools that don’t have wide telecom service yet.

Smart’s Public Access Group plans to have a total of 50 mobile Internet cafés and call centers by the end of the year.