Analyses of world-flattening trends in outsourcing, offshoring and the wider landscape of IT services are not exactly a rarity these days. But there is no lack of originality or dynamism in Global Services: Moving to a Level Playing Field, a joint study by experts in the field, Mark Kobayashi-Hillary of the National Outsourcing Association and Dr Richard Sykes, chair of the outsourcing group at industry association Intellect.

Of the book’s several rich themes, its examination of how business process outsourcing (BPO) is being extended to embrace the phenomenon of ‘knowledge process outsourcing (KPO)’ is arguably the most salient and engaging. Set to outstrip traditional BPO activity in coming years, KPO is defined by the authors as “a continuation of BPO…with rather more business complexity”, involving the provision of ‘value-added’ services, such as information analysis and decision-making, especially when those involve domain experience in a particular industry vertical.

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