Outsourcing software engineering services is a go-to strategy for companies that aim to innovate and scale while managing costs effectively. This approach allows organizations to tap into global talent pools, accessing specialized skills and expertise without the overhead of in-house development teams.
Let’s explore the key aspects of software engineering outsourcing, including its benefits, challenges, and best practices for forging successful partnerships.
Why go for software engineering outsourcing?
1. Cost optimization
One of the most significant benefits of outsourcing is cost optimization. The primary reason for this is the difference between the cost of living in different countries and, as a result, rates.
Tech professionals from Central Europe, Latin America, and other popular outsourcing destinations have much lower billing rates than those in the USA and the UK. Therefore, you can get quality software engineering services for reasonable prices.
2. Access to a vast talent pool
Outsourcing provides access to a vast pool of skilled professionals worldwide, allowing companies to find the right expertise for specific project needs. This global talent pool can offer specialized skills and experiences that may be scarce or too expensive in the local market.
3. Ability to focus on core business activities
By outsourcing software development, companies can focus more on their main strengths and strategic plans, improving productivity and competitiveness. For example, a company can outsource app development, freeing its team to focus on market research and strategy.
4. Faster time to market
The speed of software development can be used as a competitive advantage. The unpredictable delays in production are something that businesses try to avoid by all means.
Software engineering outsourcing is a way to achieve faster time to market. When you partner with a trusted vendor, you entrust the recruitment processes to them and do not depend on in-house resources for the product launch. You create the schedule your developers need to adhere to.
5. Flexibility and scalability
Outsourcing offers the flexibility to scale the development team up or down based on project requirements. Companies can adjust their team size and composition quickly and efficiently in response to changing business needs.
6. Easier technology adoption
Implementation of new technologies gets easier if you partner with a software development outsourcing company, as trusted outsourcing software providers have broad expertise and an internal pool of skilled specialists.
What are the top destinations for software engineering outsourcing?
1. Central and Eastern Europe (CEE)
Outsourcing to the CEE region offers businesses a valuable opportunity to tap into an extensive tech talent pool, gain specialized expertise, and establish partnerships with trusted tech firms to enhance their technological capabilities.
Poland, Ukraine, Romania, and the Czech Republic are home to the largest tech talent pools in the region. Poland boasts nearly 500,000 ICT specialists. Despite the ongoing war, Ukraine remains a leading outsourcing destination with 291,500 ICT professionals. Meanwhile, Hungary and Bulgaria are emerging as significant players, attributed to continuous innovation, government support for the tech sector, and an increasing pool of professionals, counting 175,000 and 101,000 ICT specialists, respectively.
The Baltic nations, with a combined tech talent pool of under 120,000, are renowned for their favorable business climate and legislative framework, making them attractive hubs for startups as well as small and medium enterprises (SMEs). Additionally, Moldova and Slovakia are becoming promising IT outsourcing destinations.
The region has a well-developed technological infrastructure, including reliable Internet connectivity and advanced IT ecosystems, which support efficient remote collaboration and software development processes.
2. Latin America
Latin America is becoming a prominent destination for software development, characterized by its vast and continuously expanding pool of highly skilled technical professionals. The region offers less intense competition for top talent than North America, facilitating quicker and easier recruitment processes.
In international rankings like the Global Services Location Index (GSLI), Global Innovation Index, and Ease of Doing Business rankings, Latin American countries consistently perform well. Notably, countries such as Colombia, Mexico, Costa Rica, and Chile are among the top 100 in the Ease of Doing Business ranking. The region's commitment to digitalization, improved infrastructure, enhancement of digital skills, and attracting foreign investment creates an accommodating environment for technology initiatives. An increasing number of accelerators, tech incubators, and technology parks further supports this.
With nearly 2M professionals in its technology sector, Latin America's robust and flourishing tech industry presents a compelling case for outsourcing software development. The region’s rich talent pool and supportive tech ecosystem make it an attractive option for companies seeking to leverage Latin America’s dynamic potential.
Learn more about software development in Latin America
3. Asia
One of the primary reasons companies opt for outsourcing in Asia is cost savings. The region offers competitive pricing models, allowing businesses to reduce development costs significantly compared to Western countries.
Asia boasts a vast pool of tech talent, with countries like India, China, and the Philippines having large numbers of engineering graduates each year. These professionals are well-versed in the latest software development technologies and methodologies. Countries like Singapore, South Korea, and Japan are known for their advanced technological infrastructure and commitment to research and development.
While English proficiency varies across the region, many Asian countries have many English-speaking professionals, which eases communication.
Your destination choice depends on your software engineering outsourcing budget, time zone, and other factors. No matter what country or region you choose, you will surely need a trusted outsourcing partner by your side. So, how do you choose the right vendor?
How to choose a partner for software engineering outsourcing?
Here are the key aspects you should consider when choosing a software outsourcing partner:
1. Profound tech expertise
It is crucial to partner with a provider that has both the technical expertise and a comprehensive service range. This partner should excel in software engineering and market analysis, prototyping, and user testing, among other areas.
At N-iX, we possess the necessary resources to nurture and enhance your product's development. We provide services in product management consulting, Product Discovery, and a variety of software engineering solutions. Our expertise extends to data analytics, cloud solutions, Artificial Intelligence, Machine Learning, and Data Science, ensuring a holistic approach to creating successful software products.
2. Established reputation and customer satisfaction
Evaluating a company's reputation and customer satisfaction levels is crucial, and this can be effectively gauged through verified customer reviews and testimonials, particularly from leading market entities. A strong presence on review platforms like Clutch, along with client feedback on its website and active participation in international tech conferences, are reliable indicators of a company's trustworthiness and professional credibility.
N-iX stands out with a 4.8 rating based on more than 30 client reviews on Clutch. The company is also recognized by major industry players like IAOP, GSA UK, Forbes, and Forrester and maintains relationships with over 160 active clients worldwide. This solidifies N-iX's status as a trusted partner in the business world.
3. Powerful employer brand
A known and trusted company can find experts for the project promptly and scale up teams efficiently, way easier than smaller ones. A poor employer brand is one of the key reasons why employees jump ship.
Thus, before partnering with a vendor, check if it provides employees with comfortable working conditions, professional growth, training opportunities, fair compensation, etc.
4. Robust security policy in place
Infrastructure vulnerabilities, phishing attacks, data losses, and high loads on IT systems—businesses face these perils every day. These cybersecurity risks are critical, as they may threaten the security of your data during software development.
To mitigate these risks, you need to find a software outsourcing company with an established security policy. Ensure that the vendor you hire a team from complies with international security standards such as ISO, PCI, and other protocols.
For instance, N-iX is certified in PCI DSS, SOC 2, FSQS, CyberGRX, ISO 9001:2008, ISO 27001, and ISO/IEC 27701:2019. Additionally, as a GDPR-compliant entity, N-iX processes align with stringent data protection regulations.
5. Broad market presence
If your partner has established its presence in multiple countries, it offers significant benefits for your organization, such as:
- Quicker recruitment of necessary specialists, leading to reduced time to market;
- The ability to select the most suitable outsourcing location, facilitating consistent and uninterrupted workflow across similar time zones;
- Increased likelihood of promptly finding rare professionals.
N-iX boasts an extensive international footprint, with operations in Ukraine, Poland, Colombia, the UK, the US, Sweden, Malta, and Bulgaria, attracting top talent from 25 countries, including but not limited to Poland, the USA, Colombia, Germany, Canada, Ukraine, Romania, and Bulgaria. This global presence enables N-iX to comprehensively address the software development needs of companies in various industries across Europe and the Americas.
Software engineering outsourcing with N-iX: Success stories
N-iX, with our extensive experience in software engineering outsourcing, has several success stories across various industries. Here are some examples that highlight their capabilities and the value we bring to our clients:
1. Lebara
Lebara is one of the fastest-growing telecoms in Europe, with operations in eight countries. In 2014, the company partnered with N-iX and made us responsible for the full-cycle development and maintenance of new products.
Initially working on the project, the small team evolved into a development center of 100 people working for Lebara. Firstly, Lebara needed to migrate its Hybris B2C platform from 4.3 to 4.8 to meet its requirements for growing its client base. Then, N-iX professionals developed the website for Lebara, available in the UK, France, Germany, the Netherlands, Spain, and Denmark.
Our client has also benefited from our BI expertise: we have been responsible for performance optimization, support, and development of the existing enterprise BI solution previously supported by IBM. Later, Lebara decided to migrate its solutions from on-premises to the cloud.
Also, N-iX supports the development of iOS applications for a range of Lebara products: Lebara Talk, Lebara Hub, and Lebara Travel, as well as Android applications for Lebara Money and Lebara Talk.
2. Gogo
Gogo is a global provider of in-flight connectivity with over 20 years of experience and more than 1,000 employees. Gogo partnered with N-iX, as they needed a complex data governance solution that aims to ensure the flawless operation of the equipment and high speed of the in-flight Internet.
First, we have helped our client with data migration to the cloud to collect and analyze a considerable amount of data from over 20 sources. Next, we have built a cloud-based unified data platform that collects and aggregates both structured and unstructured data and can process up to 3 TB of streaming data per day.
Together with Gogo, we completely migrated their data solutions to the AWS cloud and shut down its costly on-premises infrastructure.
3. Fluke Corporation
Fluke Corporation manufactures and distributes electronic test tools and software for measuring and condition monitoring.
The company has partnered with N-iX for mutual work on enhancing SCHAD’s (part of Fluke Corporation) enterprise asset management solutions.
Within this cooperation, N-iX professionals have designed the architecture of an ESB-like integration platform using well-known industry standards to match integration challenges with various CMMS systems; elaborated test cases design of the existing system; performed research and development of different technologies and solutions to satisfy business needs; provided new highly-customizable mobile user interface based on HTML5, JavaScript and CSS; worked on Asset Health Dashboard.
Why partner with N-iX for software outsourcing?
- N-iX has 21 years of experience in the global IT outsourcing market and offers high-quality solutions to its clients in healthcare, manufacturing, automotive, retail, telecom, and many other industries;
- We have offices in 25 countries, which will allow you to tap into an extensive talent pool of professional developers;
- N-iX is compliant with the security standards and regulations, including ISO 27001:2013, PCI DSS, ISO 9001:2015, GDPR, and others that ensure secure software development;
- The company has successfully delivered software engineering projects to enterprises and Fortune 500 companies and earned recognition from CRN in the Solution Provider 500 ranking.
