businessweek.com — One of the most controversial aspects of the global economy has been outsourcing, and no one embraced it like India. Of late, there are problems: engineers skip projects after only a few months and salaries are rising by 14% per year. It is no surprise then that companies are leaving India. Will Ho Chi Minh City be the new Bangalore?
Dec 11, 2006 View in Crawl 4
jivatmanxDec 11, 2006
The problem with china, is that nobody really wants to live there. The entire country is under a giant cloud of unfiltered black smoke and the country is polluted with heavy metals and mercury. Not fun.
etnuDec 12, 2006
China is never going to be a huge IT center for anything other than China and other Chinese-speaking nations. American and European MBAs accept India as a place to outsource to because the majority of the IT workers speak reasonable English. IT is not "blue collar" work. You have to be intelligent to do it, and you have to have tight communication between the people writing the code, the people making the designs, and the people making the business decisions.We've already seen many companies have problems when trying to run product in the U.S. and development in India. Most companies have abandoned that approach, and now the majority of development done in India is also managed and designed there. IBM, Microsoft, Google, Yahoo!, etc. all have significant business units in India -- and, for the most part, they're in charge of the entire product.Locality matters, and skilled engineers are going to be in demand for a long time to come, outsourcing or not. There simply aren't that many people in the world who are smart enough AND interested enough to do the job. I'd say that less than a quarter of people doing the work today are even capable of writing software on their own (they get by because they work in teams currently), and less than 10% are capable of writing "good" software. You think that's going to hold up against a significant language barrier? Good luck!
daveytDec 12, 2006
FTA: "To combat this (IP theft), Infosys Technologies has disabled USB drives on PCs to limit the ability of workers to take data out of the office.Damn. How on earth are the highly skilled computer programmers going to work around that?. If only they were high skilled computer programmers. If only.
rojer64Dec 12, 2006
If capitalists weren't so dangerous, heavy on the planet and first hand war mongers, their naive beliefs would look refreshing.Being naive doesn't justify supporting a policy that leads the planet to short term ruin and the economy to a dreadful collapse. This is why I have to digg down a refreshingly naive comment. Sorry dude, you just need to grow up.
nanostuffDec 12, 2006
"Of late, there are problems: ...salaries are rising by 14% per year."How is that a problem? Higher standards of living in India are a bad thing?Oh right, I forgot, lower profits for the corporation. Those sick twisted Indians and their ridiculous demands for decent wages.
jawoodyablowmeDec 12, 2006
There's too many failed states in Africa. The only viable state in Africa is S. Africa ...well, maybe Egypt. The rest, forget it! They're f**ked.
Closed AccountDec 12, 2006
As I mentioned before (and surprisingly got dugg down) outsourcing only brings short term gain. It looks extremely good on paper, however it alienates the customer base and makes ongoing support a nightmare. The only ones benefiting long term from outsourcing are companies that pick up projects that Indian programmers left off and salvage what's salvageable. From my experience almost every decently sized IT outfit goes through what I call childhood disease when someone discovers that Indian graduates have supposedly the same degrees in Computer Science as folks in USA, Israel, Ireland, or New Zealand, but can be paid tenth of what they are paying their current team. The engineers are assembled in the ballroom and instructed as the last order of business to prepare detailed specifications for each component. Then 90% get pink slips and leave.At some point remaining 10% starts envying those laid off. - "Do you know what inventory object is?" - "Sure". After another half hour of hopeless assault on mental barrier over the phone- "Do you know what inventory object is?" - "Sure". The time is running late. - "Do you know what inventory object is?" - "Yes." - "Ok, explain me, what is an inventory object" - "Hmmmmmm... I am not sure...". - "Ok, it is hopeless. Please copulate with somebody else's brains. I resign." And then, a realization creeps in. You get what you pay for. If the deal is too good to be true, it probably is. BSc from Bangalore Institute of Technology is not exactly the same degree as the one from Duke, Technion, or MIT. Those guys have flashy credentials and they are ready to work for peanuts. The problem is they deliver as they are being paid. Literally.And this is where the rescue and recovery firm comes into play.
etnuDec 13, 2006
"Not being able to afford"? Bulls**t. Pay for executives, managers, etc. are skyrocketing while pay for tech workers is actually decreasing. Anyone dumb enough to think that a CEO is worth 5,000+ employees should be shot on principal.
fongobongoDec 13, 2006
no, it implies that they will do whatever it takes to increase shareholder profit. Think about it, you reduce cost, you increase profit, consequently your stocks go up and if the stock offers dividends than yes it increases.
toesmedaDec 13, 2006
it was about time that the outsourcing market began taking a hit, the problem in India is not only the attrition rate but also the fact that the quality of Indian education has fallen to record low levels. except for the IIM and IITs and ISBs the rest are all very poor in terms of knowledge sharing.
Closed AccountDec 16, 2006
I've got a guy in India doing my diggs and comments for me. I've noticed an increase in humour of 85% and am digging 3 times as many stories in half the time. Only problem is, occasionally no one can understand what I'm actually saying. If that f**ker asks for a payrise I'm hiring some guy in Vietnam.
spyntekDec 17, 2006
@ globular Ok. How about I found out about your company and go to your CEO and have a chat with him and inform him of the value of outsourcing (or insourcing if you are in the US.) I tell him that I know of this company that can provide the same services required to run his company at lower costs and he/she will get a huge bonus from the shareholders for saving the company a lot of money.Then, next month, you are in the unemployment line. The next job you find I can do the same thing over and over again.And if you respond by informing me that your job can't be outsourced, fine. There are companies that provide insourcing. I am sure that there is someone from China or southeast asia who is will to relocate and work for 1/4 of your wages.I bet you won't be talking s**t then assh**e.
bynddrvnJan 13, 2009
Whatever, I work in a big four accounting firm. I will be discrete and not mention the name, but FOUR or so years after we started our Indian labor group and it has NEVER been profitable! Yes, the labor is cheap but unreliable and NOT even close to the quality that was advertised. Top management was sold a steaming pile of horse flop and everyone who sold it, laughed all the way to the bank.
startechglobalJul 31, 2009
outsourcing isn't temporary, it's just like any other process that needs to be refined and improved. The way we do it is manage projects locally but have our outsourcing teams offshore. the cost isn't as cheap as going directly to China but you can get Accenture type quality for dirt cheap comparatively. Check out this article to see how:<a class="user" href="http://www.startechglobal.com/blogs/2009/07/19/technology/layoffs-in-it-and-engineering/">http://www.startechglobal.com/blogs/2009/07/19/tec ...</a>
lunamor30Jul 21, 2011
From my own experience - Is not good and at the end not cheap!
India's outsourcing comes with problems attached!
In nearly all instances they simply do not have the skill set and the level of honesty and professionalism to provide realistic advice about what they could deliver in the first place.
But this is it, the majority of "cheap" outsourced labour is doomed for failure.