the recent slowdown in the US has caused the revenues of indian LPOs to rise by 200% in the past one year. Lawyers are one of the highest paid professionals in the US. The same work in India can be carried at 1/10th the cost. This link gives the list of top LPOs in India.
This announcement by FTI consulting adds another chapter to the consolidation wave in the ediscovery services segment. FTI is set to buy Attenex for 88$ million. This will roughly value Attnex at 3.5 as price to earning ratio. This is lower than what the ediscovery space norm is. Metalincs had 8-16x price to earning ratio. Stratify had 5-6x. Zantaz had 3.75. Guidance and Commvault trade on stock exchanges at 4-6x.
This may mean that the smaller ediscovery vendors that miss the consolidation bus might be at further risk of being devalued.
