Interest in outsourcing is increasing as organisations seek to focus on their own world-class competencies whilst tapping into the business process and IT expertise provided by outsourced service providers. Global companies and governments are facing unprecedented market and technology changes, making the business increasingly complex and difficult to manage. Creating value for shareholders and tax-payers in this environment is forcing radical changes in scale, focus, business performance, cost structure and capital utilisation and is driving fundamental changes in the very way these organisations do business.

But it is hard to predict where all this reorganisation and restructuring is going. How far will outsourcing spread? After IT, HR and Logistics, what next? Can everything be outsourced or are there underlying causes that make some areas unsuitable? Will businesses really break up into bundles of separate capabilities that come together to collaborate whenever the need arises? Will the management of outsourcing relationships become a core competence - and if so, what would it take to be world-class?