As I mentioned in one of my previous posts, the IT outsourcing industry is slowly expanding despite the downturn. Outsourcers continuously seem to be aware of the advantages of outsourcing. But what location do you choose once you have decided to move your IT development to a service provider? And how important is the location, or should you focus more on the service provider?

What should be leading the location or provider?

According to Tholons’ study Emerging Global Outsourcing Cities, October 2009, most respondents treat the choice of the provider as the most important factor in outsourcing. Analysts like Gartner claim that the location probably should be the most important decision factor. A good provider in an expensive country could in the long run not occur to be the best choice. What is the best location for your business depends on many factors like culture, time zone, language skills. Below you will find the breakdown of the regions of choice based on Tholons’ study.

Source Tholons.com

Polish predominance in the region

Due to the communistic period many people still don’t have the right picture of Central Europe. They consider these countries to be poor, industrial and dirty. I can guarantee that you might not be aware of the big changes that are going on in Central and Eastern Europe.

Nowadays, Poland for example is known as an instantly developing, high skilled destination for IT outsourcing. Especially among Western European and Scandinavian potential clients Poland is a favorite outsourcing destination. Polish ITO and BPO providers are capable of serving the wide variety of services that are in huge demand.

Poland is among the top 10 preferred Outsourcing Nations according to Tholons’ study Emerging Global Outsourcing Cities, October 2009.  This reveals Polish potential as one of the strongest services suppliers in the region, which is possible mainly thanks to highly-qualified IT community and world-class education system. This leaves other competitors far behind.

The Polish city Kraków ranks among the Top 5 Offshore Cities and Warsaw has a strong 28th place. According to the ranking Poland is constantly growing in its IT outsourcing potential. You can download a copy of the Tholons’ study here [PDF].

We are curious about your experiences with outsourcing to another country. Please feel invited to share your opinion below.