Siemens Inc., a wholly owned Philippine unit of Siemens AG, is currently eyeing an IT outsourcing deal with a bank based in the U.S., president and CEO Tertius Vermeulen said in an interview with Computerworld Philippines.

Vermeulen said the deal would involve third-party programming work that can be outsourced to the Philippines.

Under the global Siemens Business Services unit, Siemens Inc. operates a call center facility in the Philippines that provides third-party help desk services. The facility currently employs some 400 agents.

In the region, Siemens also has a call center in Singapore that primarily serves the internal requirements of the business. The company also operates similar centers in the U.S., the U.K., Ireland, Germany, Canada, and Turkey.

Siemens is looking to expand its call center workforce in the Philippines to 2,000 people in the near-term, Vermeulen said. The company opened its outsourcing division in the Philippines last January and follows other global players like IBM that also have business process outsourcing (BPO) operations in the country.