Major Global Coup for IBM SA IBM has given its South African subsidiary a massive vote of confidence, and a substantial cash injection, by using it as a base to provide technical support for its customers around the world. Ultimately thousands of jobs may be created to offer technical support and to run the back-office systems for dozens of corporate customers. (May 2005 AllAfrica)

Russia looks to make IT its 'next natural resource' Russia has made local IT development one of its top priorities, with plans for infrastructure growth, regional "technoparks," and industry-friendly legislation. The pillars of this burgeoning IT economy are Russia's strong education base and thriving software development community. But the country still faces significant challenges, among them, spotty infrastructure development, limited funds, and crime. (Apr. 2005 InfoWorld)

Offshoring Closer to Home Increasingly corporations are looking to the north -- and south to Mexico -- for lower-cost alternatives to domestic outsourcing. Canada has a highly stable workforce. In addition, there are no time zone issues, language barriers or cultural differences, which are the three biggest hurdles facing companies using off-shore service providers. (Mar. 2005 Contact Center Today)

Gartner: Outsourcing costs more than in-house Businesses often fail to take hidden costs, such as in-house backup support to the outsourced function, into account. 80% of organizations that outsource their customer management operations purely to cut costs will fail to do so, while 60% of those who outsource parts of the customer-facing process will have to deal with customer defections and hidden costs that outweigh any potential savings offered by outsourcing. (Mar. 2005 CNET)

Firm Aims To Compete With Offshore Outsourcers The strategy is to tap into underutilized IT talent pools in mid-sized American cities. The Oklahoma City center boasts a roster which includes IBM's WebSphere, IMS and DB2 applications. Next up is Florida with its abundance of retired workers and residents with expertise in mainframe computing. (Jan. 2005 Computer Reseller News)

IBM Embarks on Global Mainframe Push The tech giant will be expanding its zSeries Scholars Program by delivering systems to universities in China, including Huazhong University of Science and Technology, South China University of Technology, and Peking University. China will also be home to a proof of concept and benchmarking lab in Bejing that is expected to aid the company's mainframe sales and support operations in the region. The Scholars Program's goal is to produce 20,000 IT professionals trained in zSeries by 2010. (Oct. 2004 Enterprise IT Planet)

The Ragged Edge of Outsourcing His day had started with a conference call with India at 8am and had finally ended at 9:20pm with the follow-up conference call. With productivity three to four times lower, the total value added by IT is a fraction of what it used to be, and the average value of IT goods and services produced per average dollar spent is lower than before. I wonder which will be replaced first, the CIO or the outsourcing solution. (Jul. 2004 ComputerWorld)

End of the Affair: Bringing Outsourced Operations Back In-house Many IT organizations decide for a variety of reasons that an outsourcing arrangement just isn't working, and they pull those functions back inside. There are a host of challenges, not the least of which is the likelihood that your organization's knowledge base has probably eroded during the time the function has been outsourced. (May 2004 ComputerWorld)

Indian Election shock - Outsourcing more risky? High tech companies are in a bit of panic over the election of Sonia Gandhi’s Congress party in India. The poor didn't see any benefit trickling down from the growth in IT. All the IT boom in the country did was allow the sitting government to become drunk with its success and not see defeat staring at them. (May 2004 The Inquirer)

RE: India.rocks.US.sucks Haven't you read all those reports about unemployed US techies wanting to move to India? Losers, you thought? I won't be exaggerating if I say techies in India enjoy a demi-god status! Yeah, unlike you American techies. An Indian techie enjoys a lifestyle even the billionaires in America can only dream of. (Apr. 2004 Economic Times of India)

TCS, Wipro, Infy top BPO vendors Outsourcing within North America is growing at an average of 10-15% annually. In contrast, offshore outsourcing is growing at a rate of more than 25%, while mainframe outsourcing is growing at less than 10%. (Jan. 2004 Economic Times)

Shifting Work Offshore? Outsourcer Beware The business-software maker was looking for ways to cut costs. So two years ago, it farmed out a software-programming project to a small outfit in India, expecting to cut expenses by 40%. But the savings never materialized. The main reason: The code the Indians delivered was riddled with errors. (Jan. 2004 Business Week)