OFFSHORE ADVISORY SERVICES

Organizations have, over the years, adopted a diverse mix of offshore options. These options have mainly been either a selective offshoring and/or an Offshore Development Center (ODC) with focus on a single- or a multi-vendor approach. To date, the predominant drivers for offshorization has been cost, quality, easier access to required technical talent, faster ramp-up and accelerated delivery.

However, any offshore strategy formulated around achieving these benefits, has been adding little or nothing when it comes to ensuring the alignment of IT with business. Various industry research estimates that 80% of IT budgets go into maintaining existing applications, leaving only 20% for new projects. In addition, economic and regulatory frameworks over the last few years have resulted in several emerging challenges for organizations. Such dynamic considerations have made it imperative for them to assess the financial viability of their IT portfolio. With most organizations' applications being supported from offshore, it is very important to have business-IT alignment as a part of their offshore strategy. In addition, the selection of an appropriate offshore engagement model also becomes a key issue as organizations go forward on the Transformational Offshore Outsourcing Path. Though traditionally organizations have been concentrating on ODC as the only possible solution, there has to be a focus on other engagement models (like BOT, JV, Captive, etc.) as a part of their evaluation process.

Strategic Edge has been instrumental in developing long-term offshore strategies for their large customers. Based on our experience of setting-up and managing large ODCs for clients, our involvement has been right from the conceptualization stage. Strategic Edge plays a major role in developing the transition roadmap to enable effective implementation of a long-term offshore outsourcing strategy.