Honduran Students, Carrying an Evolved World-View, See Beyond Borders
January 19th, 2010By Kirk Laughlin, Editorial Director
I wonder what it would feel like if educated people I met in nearby countries in this Hemisphere had no recognition of New England, the place where I was born and grew up. How would I feel if they looked at me as if New England – its seafaring history, the Tea Party and Native American Tribes - was 
pretty much irrelevant.
The group from Del Campo School in Tegucigalpa, Honduras
In meeting with several groups of high school and college students in Honduras last week, during a tour of the country’s growing global services industry, one of the first things we talked about was how much these students understood about the United States, its influence in Latin America and the model of democracy and transparency it represents. But as they talked about their own personal encounters with Americans, they uniformly described instances where people had no idea where Honduras was – or simply, that it was another stone-age third-world country that didn’t matter.
It’s surprising in a way that these students show little to no anger about this wide-gap in awareness. They are accepting of the way things really are, showing a maturity that is well beyond what you might expect from typical 16 and 17-year-old youths, all of which have Facebook accounts through which they often learn about the larger world beyond their borders. As highly fluent English-speakers, developed in most cases through English exposure and practice since age 5, these students talked openly about their personal hopes and the transformative dreams they have for Honduras, which in recent months has been a target of worldwide condemnation because of the coup to replace a president (Mel Zelaya) who was, according to countless Hondurans, moving the country down a dangerous path away from democracy.
Investment Interest in Honduras: Nearshore Americas Visits San Pedro Sula (Espanol)
January 19th, 2010“Hay interés de invertir en SPS” Un experto norteamericano visitó el
(Source: LaPrensa.HN)
By Yesille Ponce: yesille.ponce@laprensa.hn
San Pedro Sula, Honduras
Compañías de telecomunicaciones mundialmente reconocidas como Verizon, Sprint y AT& T podrían instalar fácilmente sus centro de llamadas para brindar respuestas a sus clientes desde esta ciudad, segú Kirk Laughlin, experto norteamericano en el tema de tercerización de servicios.
Laughlin visitó el país hace unos días con el fin de proporcionar una amplia perspectiva de las oportunidades de tercerización para algunos inversionistas que tienen interés en San Pedro Sula y el resto de Honduras. Habló con NEGOCIOS sobre el futuro de esta industria.
Todo para atraer inversión
El experto confirmó las ventajas con que cuenta la capital industrial, en especial, en el tema de costo, talento humano y estabilidad política, que es clave para invertir. Agregó, que empresas activas en el Caribe dedicadas al cobro de tarjetas de crédito y bancos optarían por colocar …
On the Ground in Honduras: A Closer Look at a Central American Upstart
January 13th, 2010
By Kirk Laughlin, Editorial Director
Nearshore Americas is spending several days on the ground this week in Honduras for a couple of very good reasons which I will be talking about and exploring on some interesting videos over the course of the next two weeks. We have been interviewing high level government officials, education and human capital leaders, telecom regulators and business leaders while traveling with our host from Altia Business Park, Ruben Sorto, who is the marketing director at the San Pedro Sula based facility, which is the first world-class business center in Honduras designed to service BPO and call center operations.
Ruben joined me (we’re both at the far right on the panel) today on a …
World-Class Honduras BPO Facility Set to Open in February
November 12th, 2009SOURCE: LAPRENSAHN.COM (Translated from Espanol)
Altia Park will unveil a new service industry that opens the doors for foreign and domestic companies with the installation of first three-tower communications in February, 2010. This is expected to generate about a thousand jobs in the north of the country.
Daniel Facussé, president of the Honduran Maquila Association, AHM, said that Altia will succeed because everything relating to the sale of communication becomes more profitable to firms in these times of crisis and it also involves outsourcing. Maquila Association provides this service and does so within institutions.
Ruben Sorto, marketing manager Karim’s group, which has started this initiative, explained that despite the blows of the economic crisis, the play was not halted.
To implement this type of modernistic buildings, said Sorto, the country now has favorable conditions, such as having the best fiber optic network in Central and communication infrastructure at low cost. …
So far, 2009 looks like a good year for the emerging Honduras BPO community.
The first tenants at Altia business park are planning to move into the state-of-the-art facility in September.
Worldwide outsourcing provider ACS recently announced plans to locate a call center near San Pedro Sula and operators of several industrial parks are helping make the case to invest in Honduras – a country that is becoming well-known for strong English language skills. There are well over 400 English language schools operating in Honduras. In fact, in a story that came out today in the Honduras publication “La Prensa” (click on this link for the Googlized English translation,) the author claims that Honduras has more bilingual speakers per capita …
