ResourcePad Blog

According to Silicon.com, because outsourcing is experiencing a general slump in the US, Europe should be the key destination for those in the offshore outsourcing market. Indeed, to that extent, many vendors I know have begun to shift their focus to Australia, Germany and the like where until a few months ago, their key demo was the American market. Just goes to show how quickly things change in the IT business.

Another thing that’s worrying is the increasing reports of a global slowdown in outsourcing - TPI states that there’s been a 17% reduction in projects which is the largest decrease since 2001 in the first three quarters of the financial year. However, although the average contract value of outsourced projects in the US were down 38% to about $179 million, Europe showed an equal (35%) increase in their average totaling $277 million, which is approximated $100 million more than the US. While Europe only had a global (outsourcing) market share of about 37% last year, they’re now dominating with a 56% stake in the pie.

So if you’re a vendor, turn your eyes towards Europe and prepare to up your ante especially if you’re from South Asia competing with winners like Romania, Bulgaria, etc.

You can read the full article here.

AT Kearney, the independent research firm recently brought up a study conducted with 50 companies who outsource their business or IT processes offshore to get a better idea of what works for them. Needless to say, the study uncovered some interesting things including the fact that, to quote the report, ‘revenue performance improvement might be offshoring’s diamond in the rough’. Which means what, exactly? It means offshore outsourcing not only helps companies with their own workload and implementation of services they either don’t have the expertise to do themselves, or because of budgeting constraints; it also helps in profit margins. Outsourcing is actually pushing up revenues for corporations according to the study.

This may be the best news the offshore outsourcing industry has heard in months, especially with news of some companies stating that it’s over hyped and overused.

ResourcePad’s got it covered of course, under an excellent article written by new contributer Tom Kricheck. You can view it here.

Recently I came across a set of questions promoting cultural differences across the offshore platform, and though these issues are real and they do exist and they can cause quite a bit of problems for SMEs especially those who can’t waste important cash to start training programs; there’s a lot to be said for the basic rule: communication, and lots of it.

There have been a lot of new articles springing up on ResourcePad.com which I would advise you all to read, because not only are they informative and helpful, but they’re coming from people much like ourselves who’ve either started their own companies, have been working for other SMEs or who’ve been in the outsourcing development area for a couple of years.

We’re still working on our miniature Flash promo and hope to hear your comments on it once it’s been uploaded.

Cheers,

Alex