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zations and liberalization in Latin America in the nineties.
Telefónica, for example, according to the 2002 ranking of the AméricaEconomía
journal, is the largest foreign corporation operating in Latin America: Adding up all of
the investments of Telefonica’s subsidiaries in different Latin American countries 128
amounts to total investments of more than 30 billion Euros, 129 from which 31 percent
of Telefónica’s global total revenue was obtained. 130 Telefónica’s focus lies on Brazil,
where more than 17 billion US-dollars were invested over the last five years. 131
Telefónica’s profits are to a large extent due to their business in Brazil, according
to the corporation’s global numbers. And this is obviously not ultimately due to situations
like the one which occurred in the state of São Paolo, where after the takeover
of Telesp by Telefónica the fluctuation reserve against variations in power of 20% was
abolished for reasons of costs, with the consequence of severe supply bottlenecks
in the metropolitan São Paolo area, where Telesp, now a subsidiary of Telefónica, is
the only network supplier. This situation even led to the appointment of a parliamentary
fact-finding committee, Commissão Parlamentar de Inquérito (CPI).
According to the Ranking500 of AméricaEconomía, in 2002 the Telefónica
–subsidiary, Telesp, realized sales of 2.855 billion US-dollars and net profits of 304.5
million US-dollars. 132 Telefónica is not only in the telecommunications business, its
subsidiary Atento is Brazil’s largest provider of telemarketing services and among
other things has taken over all call –center services for FIAT in Brazil. 133 According to
the Estado de São Paulo, as of October 27, 2003, Atento plans to export this kind
of call –center services to the world market. 134 They were sued in 1999 by the union
of telemarketing employees, Sintratel, 135 several times for paying wages lower than
the collective agreement of only 83% of the sectoral compensation system 136 and for
not complying with labor laws.
128 AméricaEconomía, July 2003.
129 Maria Manuel Ramos / José Félix Ribeiro: O Investimento Directo Espanhol: da América Latina para a Europa
Continental, p. 423.
130 Numbers for 1998-1999, ibid., p. 433.
131
http://www.ftd.de/tm/tk/1055066659117.html?nv=sl.
132
Amércia Economia: Ranking 500, July 4-31, 2003, p. 66.
133
B2B Magazine, October 22, 2003.
134
http://www.estado.estadao.com.br/editorias/2003/10/27/eco036.html.
135
Sindicato dos Trabalhadores de Telemarketing e de Radiochamadas do Estado de São Paulo.
136 O Estado de São Paulo, October 8, 1999.