Russia is a “Challenger” in Global Outsourcing

Although that this year, Russia has received a much better rating in this annual outsourcing guide prepared by the CIO Magazine then it had in the past, the bight idea of moving your IT functions to the country still seems darkened by certain drawbacks, and we dare to seriously question them.

The author agrees that the highly skilled labor pool of Russia adds a distinctly boutique touch to the IT outsourcing services the country offers, thus suggesting a special focus on complex modeling and showcasing creative problem-solving. On the negative side, the issues of piracy and poor infrastructure are quoted.

The much-talked-of piracy within the borders of the Russian Federation is the typical legacy of emerging economies, and Russia is already adequately facing it. Russian IPR protection legislation is fully compatible with international standards and law enforcement is getting to be on the right track. Joint efforts of vendors and government, along with the growing wealth all around the country show real progress, and today, even Microsoft reports significant improvement of the situation with the licensing of popular Microsoft products. Needless to say that when it comes to Russian IT outsourcing service providers - IP rights are earnestly protected, and there is not a single case of IPR violation by a Russian ESP.

In its turn, the topic of Russian infrastructure was very well covered in the “Talent, Infrastructure, Culture Attract CIOs to Russia” report, prepared by AT&T back (!) in January 2005. The cited Russia’s top networking facts include: mobile phone penetration that is higher than in major U.S. cities (70% in Moscow compared to 54% in NYC), growing VoIP (the largest market in Europe, 6th largest in the world), the widespread broadband with over 1,250,000 active xDSL lines and the year-over year growth rate of weekly Internet viewers was at 85% in 2005. With this in mind, one would not describe the fastest growing telecom market in Europe as the one with poor infrastructure.