If you are a forward-looking business owner, you may know that software development outsourcing is a well-accepted way to optimize costs and expand your talent pool. This business strategy not only relieves the burden of hiring and empowerment costs but also delivers the highest quality product on time and within budget.
Outside expertise is so beneficial financially and business-wise that most entrepreneurs have no doubts about outsourcing. Yet like you, they may also have trouble deciding which countries are the best for outsourcing software development.
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Contact usGiven that there are hundreds of IT outsourcing centers worldwide, each boasting quality services, culture, and experience, you will have to conduct a lot of research to choose the destination where to hire a development team.
We at Relevant Software have done this painstaking work instead of you and analyzed the particular qualities of the best countries for offshore software development by main criteria. Our study will help you make the right decision based on your priorities. So let’s get comfy and read.
Table of Contents
Let’s begin with the fact that in countries with product-oriented IT markets, there is an acute shortage of qualified developers who are not busy with other projects. Hiring locals in, say, the US, Western Europe, and the UK can be incredibly time-consuming (the recruitment process can take 6-12 months) and expensive as these countries’ salary rates are extremely high.
Fortunately, the global economy and communication channels make it possible to hire skilled software engineers abroad. Outsourcing to low-cost countries is reasonable due to cheaper infrastructure, lower labor costs, and considerable tax benefits. It remains only to find one that offers the best pool of advantages and meets all companies’ requirements for outsourcing. We will list these below, and they will lay the groundwork for comparing these countries as outsourcing providers.
You can choose an outsourcing provider from anywhere in the world. Still, you should consider the level of technical education of specialists in the country where you are going to work. There is a sharp difference between nations that provide a basic education in computer science and information technology and those that take a more in-depth approach to studying STEM. The former rarely demonstrates good programming skills, while the latter lead AI development.
When evaluating necessary technical experience, outsourcers must consider the project’s complexity level and the technologies used to overcome these problems effectively. The countries outsourcing may differ in technology usage from the countries projects outsourced to.
The best countries for outsourcing are non-English speaking countries. But IT’s language is English, so you expect the outsourced developers you hire to be fluent in reading, writing, and speaking English to negotiate and look for ways to solve problems.
Only a few pay attention to the differences in mentality before starting profitable cooperation. However, this seemingly insignificant nuance can play a cruel joke, as different approaches to collaboration and problem-solving can prevent consistent interaction.
While the primary benefit of outsourcing is cost reduction, the focus should not be on price alone. The common misconception is that any software provider may offer you the same services and vary in price, but this is far from the case. Companies differ in expertise and tech stack and provide different types of services. Thus, finding the optimum price/quality ratio rests on your shoulders.
We’ve added time zones as a factor, but we want to point out that nowadays, most software companies have learned to collaborate across different time zones. Modern control systems make it possible to minimize possible inconveniences at work; therefore, the difference in time zones does not significantly impact the process.
So we will focus on the abovementioned factors in our further comparison. We will look at the basic criteria that show the general scope of strong and weak points related to each country to help you choose one of the best offshore software development countries.
Going back to the question of which countries are the best for software development outsourcing, we will try to answer it by comparing representatives of 4 global outsourcing destinations. While we have focused on a few top countries in the software industry in this article – Ukraine, Poland, India, and Argentina, they represent other countries in their respective regions.
Ukrainian IT is at the forefront of the most sustainable industries, with a pool of specialists of about 240 thousand. By October 2022, about 44% of all services exported from Ukraine were delivered by Ukrainian IT outsourcers.
This is not surprising because a convenient time zone, open culture, and high professionalism make Ukraine one of the best destinations for software outsourcing. In turn, the Ukrainian tax policy, payment practices, and labor costs allow setting rates below the average for the CEE outsourcing market with equal or even higher quality.
That is why Boeing, Siemens, Oracle, Samsung, and many other largest technology giants have R&D centers in Ukraine, and startups like Grammarly, GitLab, and DepositPhotos have dominated their niches for years.
Poland is located in Central Europe, although sometimes it falls into the list of “Eastern Europe” countries. In the 2021 Kearney Global Services Location Index, Poland was ranked the twelfth most attractive country for outsourcing. The developer pool in this country consists of 295,000 specialists. Most are programmers (57%), and the rest are QA specialists (15%).
Polish developers are known for being tech-savvy people who can do amazing things in everything from e-commerce to video games. In addition, they are in the same time zone as their main customers in Western Europe. Otherwise, most Polish companies understand their advantages and charge higher rates than others in Eastern Europe.
Known for its European cultural roots, Argentina has become one of the largest technology hubs in Latin America, with a tech pool of 114K specialists. Despite recent economic difficulties, Argentina’s IT industry has experienced exponential growth, mostly due to a renewed emphasis on education, government assistance, a big pool of tech specialists, and favorable labor costs and time zones.
India was one of the first countries to successfully capitalize on the first wave of demand for IT and BPO outsourcing. The country has consistently developed a low-skilled workforce to meet traditional demand. By 2024 India will have 5 million developers, the largest base in the world. However, there is a gap between the need for digitally savvy professionals and the talent pool that India is producing.
Location, individual professional experience, and company policy, among others, are the key factors defining the cost rate in every particular country. So, when considering costs, you must research and explore every opportunity to suit your needs best. The table below shows average rates in several professions, according to Accelerance. (Note that these average figures may differ from software companies’ rates).
| India | Ukraine | Poland | Argentina | |
| Sr. Software Engineer | $41-49 | $40-70 | $68-76 | $65-82 |
| DevOps | $29-44 | $45-60 | $53-71 | $59-82 |
| Sr. QA | $35-46 | $40-63 | $54-74 | $59-72 |
| Business Analyst | $40-61 | $50-70 | $57-81 | $56- 68 |
| UI/UX Designer | $38-43 | 40-60$ | $53-71 | $48-75 |
Whether you decide to outsource software development to Argentina, India, Poland, or Ukraine, strive to work with highly qualified professionals who can comprehend a client’s objectives and turn a creative idea into an inventive solution. That’s the end goal, isn’t it?
The four best countries to outsource software development are now known to you. Although ratings and descriptions are subjective and can not offer a complete picture, knowing what to expect is the initial step toward success. The second step is to choose the development team – professionals in technology and innovation.
If you decide to outsource your software development to Ukraine – you couldn’t get better! Then you don’t need to worry about looking for the right outsourcing vendor because you have already found it here – in Relevant Software. We have been in the outsourcing market for over 10 years, and our track record encompasses long-term cooperation with clients from the US, Europe, and the UK.
Our specialists are well-versed in web and mobile development, сloud deployment, AI and ML solutions, Data Analytics, DevOps, embedded software, and more. Wide knowledge has helped us to deliver 200+ unique software products that fully match clients’ expectations. So don’t look for a needle in a haystack but contact us to get relevant developers today.
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