Frazzetto: "Mentality shift"

By Jon Tonti

Global CIOs are more focused than ever on activities that generate revenue and they are leveraging their global sourcing strategies not to save money, but instead to invent new business verticals, according to the newly released  2012 Harvey Nash CIO Survey.   As the architecture of a company’s systems becomes synonymous with its business model, CIOs are crafting souring strategy not just directed at cost savings, but also revenue generation.

A few highlights: 

• 60% of CIOs have responsibilities beyond their national boarders
• Outsourcing key development skills will be a priority for 46% of CIOs this year
• 75% of CIOs have at least a quarter of their workforce made up from flexible labor
• The use of multisourcing will increase this year for 43 percent of CIOs
• More than half of CIOs in 2012 (56 percent) say projects that make money from technology rather than save money are the priority for their CEOs. The search for growth is on, and organizations are increasingly looking to emerging markets to pursue it. And with almost two-thirds of this year’s respondents having a global or multinational focus (60 percent), the CIO is going to be key to unlocking this growth potential
• Looking ahead, almost half of the respondents (46 percent) plan to increase spend on outsourcing this year. This compares to 45 percent in 2011, but is 10 percent up on 2010 figures (36 percent) when IT budgets were more tightly constrained and economic uncertainty was more acute
• Strategic priorities now focus on improving time to market for new products and services (a priority for 24 percent of CIOs versus only 17 percent in 2011); supporting mergers and acquisitions (15 percent, up from 12 percent in 2011); and investing time, focus and resources in mobile commerce (up from 17 percent in 2011 to 22 percent in 2012)
• CIOs recognize there is still a significant gap in the expectations between the innovation ambition of their organization and the innovation reality in their IT department

Simple Evolution, or Not

Obviously cost savings remains the driver for BPO and IT Services outsourcing which has perhaps obscured possible innovation and revenue generating activities leveraged with captive operations and or relationships with third party service providers.  As the cost-savings-focus reaches a saturation point companies are looking to turn their IT departments, in conjunction with their outsourced service providers, towards profit seeking activities; however, it’s not an easy or fluid process for all companies.

“The reality is IT is broken in many companies, and it cannot be just about keeping the lights on,” says Erik Tomasi COO at DTG Consulting Solutions and former CIO at White Mountains Re Services.  When prodded about how nearshoring can contribute to innovation instead of just taking on mundane processes he said one obstacle is that “the deals (SLAs) are wrapped so tightly and cost-driven that there is little room for innovation; it is a laggard.” (The Harvey Nash report boasts 2,438 participating CIOs and delivers perspective on how CIOs are managing the intersection of technology and strategic global sourcing.)

The rigid view of outsourcing as strictly a mode to free an organization of routine-commodity business processes rapidly falls away as skills shortages in the US motivate companies to outsource critical activities that utilize the most current and innovative technologies to build solutions that engage customers and generate revenue.  That reality is chipping away at the once persistent outsourcing stigma that a company must accept a worker that has less potential to be disruptively innovative for the sake of labor arbitrage.

“You talk to the vast majority US teenagers, whom are great users of technology, but they don’t want to be part of the team that builds it.”

“The mentality around that has shifted; it has changed because of the skill shortage.  The gap of available talent has increased; mobile, social media technologies, you just cannot find it in the US,” says Anna Frazzetto, Senior Vice President of Technology Solutions a Harvey Nash USA.  She mentioned that of 56% of CIOs polled in the survey that feel they have skill shortages in their organizations shot up 7% largely because of the scarcity of talent in mobile and social media technology realms.

Paradoxically, many IT departments in conjunction with their providers are dedicating themselves to these technologies to create new sources of revenue.

“The digital space and mobile apps,” are examples of where CIOs are developing technology projects that aim to make money rather than just save it said Frazzetto.

“Efforts related to understanding the customer, big data, and better information access for the company,” are where CIOs need to be to leverage the skills of their IT resources to drive profits remarked Tomasi.

Not Changing Anytime Soon

The US has seen a decline in STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics) graduates over that last few decades and the amount of STEM graduates among 25-34 year-olds in employment shows the US well below the OECD (Organization of Economic Co-operation and Development) average of many Asian, European, and Latin countries.

“You talk to the vast majority US teenagers, whom are great users of technology, but they don’t want to be part of the team that builds it,” said Frazzetto.  “And then you have places like Vietnam where 85% of graduates are in math and science.”

The result is the obvious global talent search for the non-origin dependent knowledge worker and the full recognition that that worker is a potential source of innovation and creator of revenue generating activities.

Guillermo Bodnar, US CTO, explains why Globant went for the Nextive acquisition.

Q/A with leading NAFTA expert and attorney, John Crespo

By Luke Bujarski

Recent news headlines are fraught with controversy involving multinationals operating in Latin America.  Spain’s Repsol has now officially sued the Argentine government over last month’s nationalization of oil company YPF. Wal-Mart Corporation (operating in Mexico with the “Walmex’ brand)  is also on the defensive as a corruption scandal in Mexico threatens to incite deeper investigations into the company’s global operations.  To gain a better sense of business environment and legal protections afforded to international investors operating in the region, we turned to John Crespo, Partner and Latin America practice lead at King & Spalding. 

For ease of doing business, Crespo's ranking, in order: Chile, Peru, Colombia and Mexico

We first met up with John in New York at last month’s Bloomberg Latin America Investing conference, where YPF and recent trade agreements between the U.S., Colombia and Panama were major topics of debate.  Since the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) provides a rich context and legal benchmark for international business dealings in the region, we questioned John on some of the specifics around market access, trade regulation, foreign investment laws, intellectual property laws, and dispute settlement in Mexico:

NSAM – What unique legal provisions does NAFTA provide multinationals operating in Mexico?

Crespo – NAFTA is an expansive international custom trade agreement between the U.S., Mexico, and Canada enacted back in 1994 that broke down aggressive trade tariffs between these three markets.  It also established intellectual property protections and perhaps most importantly in this regard, brought about changes to Mexican law set to protect trade secrets of foreign investors.  NAFTA also lowered barriers to labor entry by providing for special work visas for professionals in production and manufacturing, but also for marketing and sales personnel.  It also provides comprehensive protections to foreign direct investment (FDI) giving recourse for international arbitration and non-local venue for dispute resolution to foreign investors of a member state in similar scope to the protections afforded in bilateral investment treaties.

NSAM – What are some of the legal challenges inherent to Mexico’s business landscape? 

Crespo – Mexico in terms of ease of doing business is ranks near the top regionally.  The general processes of incorporation are fairly well established and investor friendly. If I had to rank Mexico on business friendliness I would put it in 4th place after Chile, Peru, and Colombia. Where Mexico may be lagging is in the registration of property. If you want to register property it is a lengthy process that can take up to four months if not more.  The preparation and payment of taxes can also be more tedious compared to other countries especially with respect to income tax.  There are also issues with electricity supply around the process and permitting of energy for large industry and commercial operations.

NSAM – When it comes to market entry, what legal precautions should investors be mindful of? 

Crespo – In terms of entry by acquisition i.e. via asset transfer instead of a stock deal there are certain aspects that can be tricky, particularly when it comes to land and labor regulations. For any form of acquisition, if you’re not careful how you perform diligence regarding the acquisition or structure initial agreements you can be liable for severance obligations and trailing liability for breaches of the foreign corruption act, like Wal-Mart’s current situation in Mexico where accusations of bribery over land deals are costing the organization millions of dollars in legal fees.

NSAM – Mexico’s legal system is based on civil law.  Does this have an impact on contracts/dispute resolution?

Crespo – With respect to pure investment protection from governmental action, NAFTA helps break down some of these incongruent barriers to the extent that it provides for a framework to go to the World Bank’s international arbitration forum, but these protections under NAFTA are limited to disputes between a foreign investor and the Mexican Government. When it comes to private agreements, the parties should also seek to exclude local forums in favor of private international arbitration forums such as the International Court of Arbitration (ICC). So if you’re contracting with a Mexican counterpart you have greater opportunity to enforce a favorable judgment outside the confines of Mexican jurisdiction, especially if your counter-party is a Mexican multinational with assets abroad.  When you’re dealing with the purchase of land you have greater difficulty in having adequate recourse through arbitration given the localized nature of land purchases.

You will be subject to Mexican court system which is much different than common law in terms of evidentiary procedures and speed of adjudication. It’s also important to remember that not all states in Mexico are alike and neither are their court systems. From a procedural aspect you might be better off doing business in the federal capital or Monterrey where international business practices are more established.

NSAM – How will the recent free trade agreement between Colombia/US impact that country? 

Crespo – Even without the free trade agreement Colombia in terms of ease of doing business probably ranks ahead of Mexico.  Although Colombia’s international trade agreement may not be as expansive as NAFTA, in terms of additional protections, it should be a tremendous boon for Colombian competitiveness. Look at the Mexican companies today – they are huge multinationals.  The successes that companies like Grupo Bimbo, Cemex, Aeromexico have had are partly attributable to the opening of trade barriers and the strengthening of legal frameworks via NAFTA. These agreements will also help the country overcome perception hurdles, mainly concerns over drug violence and how it affects investor confidence. For example, two-three years ago you couldn’t talk to sovereign wealth funds about Colombia.  Today is a different story and Colombia is being flooded with foreign capital.

By Jagdish Dalal

George Santayana once wrote: “Those that fail to learn from history, are doomed to repeat it.” I also like what Albert Einstein wrote, “Insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results.”

So it is for many providers who do not have a structured process for learning from their past performance. Customers expect their providers to continuously improve their performance. In a competitive world of outsourcing, providers benefit by reducing service defects, thereby improving customer satisfaction and their bottom line. After all, failure to meet performance levels ends up costing them in their margin – directly or indirectly.

Working with providers, I have encouraged them to use a formal “lessons learned” process. I advocate that this be an ongoing, established program rather than a periodic event.

Lessons Learned Process

It is a formal process and a foundation for quality review. It provides a method for clinically dissecting performance, documents factors impacting the outcome and creates a framework for learning. It is not a “witch hunt” or “who shot John” game. The intent of a successful lessons learned process is to identify factors influencing results and delve deeper into the root cause for each of them. Therefore, the process is designed to evaluate both failure – missed performance –and success– expectations met. In quality process, this is often associated with creating a “fishbone” (or Ishikawa) diagram. Let’s look at how to design and successfully conduct a lessons learned process.

Creating Lessons Learned Framework

A structured framework for the lessons learned helps not only in identifying factors but also as a learning tool for future performance. A typical “fishbone” diagram describes the outcome and then creates a set of categories for factors that affected the outcome. In a structured lessons learned framework, it is important to have these categories standardized, so that over a period of time, we can establish patterns and trends. The following diagram shows one of these standards that I have recommended to providers with whom I work.

Conducting Lessons Learned Exercise

It is essential that a lessons learned exercise is formal, consistent and involves all people that are directly, and at times, indirectly, engaged in the activity. As mentioned earlier, these exercises should be for both successful and unsuccessful outcomes, so that learning can be analyzed from both perspectives. I recommend the following seven step process:

1. Assemble the team that will conduct the exercise. A discussion leader and a scribe need to be appointed so that the meeting rules and etiquettes are followed. Ideally, the conference room is organized so that there are seven category flip chart pages and a separate flip chart for documenting brainstorming items. I have found that a conference room without chairs (where everyone is standing) is more conducive to brainstorming than people sitting around a large table.

2. Agree on the “head” of the fishbone, describing the outcome as specifically as possible. For example: “project metrics were not met” or “project completed ahead of schedule and under budget.” Clarify categories for everyone involved, so that they do not become a matter of interpretation later during the exercise.

3. Conduct brainstorming session. Typical brainstorming process is:

a. Each person (on a round robin basis) lists the contributing factor. These factors should be as factual as possible and not just “here-says” or opinions regarding the cause. Causes will be determined later.

b. As each person contributes a factor, no discussion takes place (except for clarification purposes only).

c. Round robin process continues everyone has exhausted factors to contribute (people can “pass” during the round robin if they have no new factors to contribute).

d. Document all of the factors on a flip chart (as they were stated).

4. Once brainstorming is complete, each of the factors are discussed, categorized and placed on the appropriate flip chart. Discussion can lead to adding more factors or eliminating ones discussed.

5. Once all factors are categorized, each category is studied to see common causes and a more thorough “root” cause analysis done. Root cause analysis is conducted by asking the question “why” until there can be no further drilled down. Typically it will take at least five “whys” to get to the root cause. These root causes, by each category are documented separately and if necessary, prioritized by their perceived influence on the outcome.

6. Final steps in the lessons learned exercise is to document these root causes, and projects created, to either reinforce their impact (if they resulted in a positive result) or come up with a solution to avoid/mitigate them on future projects.

7. Final outcome, lessons learned categories and root causes are then stored in a single document so that others can study them later and learn from past mistakes or accomplishments. When I worked at Xerox, we called this our “book of knowledge” and each project manager was required to study the book prior to launching a new project. This is a process that allows one to learn from history.

Honest, open lessons learned exercises and in depth assessment of root causes, helps create an environment where past performance becomes a guide for future improvements. As George Washington wrote in a letter to Fielding Lewis (July 6, 1780): “To rectify past blunders is impossible, but we might profit by the experience of them.”

Jagdish(Jag) Dalal is Founder and President of JDalal Associates LLC (JDA) and Managing Director, Thought Leadership for IAOP and a world-renowned consultant in the field of outsourcing. Dalal is a Certified Outsourcing Professional (COP®). He can be reached at JDalal@JDalalAssociates.com

glendonTodd Capital LLC, a private equity firm that focuses on investments in business services companies and investments in real estate, announces the acquisition of Toutatis Inc. by glendonTodd Capital LLC and Performa Partners.

Based in São Paulo, Brazil, Toutatis Inc. is a full service business process outsourcing (BPO) provider in Latin America and offers a wide variety of BPO solutions in human resource outsourcing, finance and accounting outsourcing and procurement outsourcing. The firm has offices in ten countries throughout Central and South America, including: Argentina, Brazil, Chile, Columbia, Ecuador, Mexico, Paraguay, Peru, Venezuela, and Uruguay, giving it the ability to serve international clients with operations throughout the region. The company’s unique ability to deliver BPO services across Latin America from its shared service center in Uberlândia offers flexible and cost-efficient solutions by providing user-friendly, accurate, seamless execution.

Todd Furniss, Managing Partner of glendonTodd Capital explains, “We focus on those industries and companies located in favorable macro-economic environments where we can help create disproportionate value, and we think that Brazil has a very bright economic picture for at least the next five years. Toutatis has a robust services platform and customer base in key markets throughout Latin America that we can leverage for growth. Together with Marcelo Franca, and our great operating partners at Performa, we have the ability to execute on our vision and realize significant stakeholder value creation.”

Marcelo Franca, CEO of Toutatis stated, “Our relationship with glendonTodd, allows us to take advantage of world class operational insights and financial execution capabilities to propel Toutatis onto the global stage.”

The company’s unique value proposition and delivery capability, reinforced by glendonTodd’s and Performa’s strategic capital and operational insights, position Toutatis well for growth and shareholder value creation.

By Steve Mezak

Are you interested in exploring the agile methodology for developing software at your company, but you’re worried that it feels like writing a blank check to the developer? It’s a commonly held belief among companies looking for outsourced software development that agile could potentially cost more than traditional methodologies. However, the nature of how agile development works, combined with a well-defined structure for funding it, ensures that you can produce a great piece of software without breaking the bank.

Two approaches to funding Agile – Fixed Budgeting Approach

The first step to ensuring that your company’s agile development meets your budget requirements is deciding upon whether to go with a fixed budget or continuous funding. A fixed budget is exactly what it sounds like–your company sets the maximum amount that they’re willing to spend for the software, and the development team works on the project until they hit the budget ceiling. Fixed budgeting is a good funding approach for companies that are not entirely familiar with the agile development process, and they want to make sure that there is a distinct budget cap.

Because the agile development process insures that you have a finished piece of software at the end of every sprint, you’re saving time and money with either continuous funding or fixed budgeting.

A fixed budget doesn’t mean you end up with an unfinished project. Instead, agile development works hand-in-hand with fixed budgeting because stages of the project (or sprints) are each completed within a set amount of time; at the end of every sprint you have a complete piece of software as well as an update on how much of the budget is left.

The development team covers the most important and critical features in the first sprint, shows you the result, and you give the  green light for the second sprint to add more features, work out bugs, or even take the software in a different direction if that’s what market conditions require. Though it may not be as comprehensive and feature-rich as you might want in the future, it’s still a solid version 1.0 that you can beta-test since the most critical features are already developed.

Funding Agile – Continuous Funding Approach

Continuous funding is typically used by more experienced companies that know how agile works and are confident in the development team. The company outlines what they need, the team figures out how long it will take, and they create a detailed prioritization of the product backlog of features, separating those features into a smaller backlog for each sprint. If they reach the end of the sprint without fully completing all the features, they take it out and move on with what works instead of dragging out the deadline for who knows how long trying to figure out just one bug. The difference between continuous funding and a fixed budget is that continuous funding allows the development team to work on critical and non-critical features at the same time because the budget allows for more time to continue working on various features rather than focusing only on the mission-critical ones.

The Best Part About Agile? You Save Money Either Way

Because the agile development process insures that you have a finished piece of software at the end of every sprint, you’re saving time and money with either continuous funding or fixed budgeting. Instead of waiting for months or years to see the end result, you get a real, workable update within a specific period of time, giving your company the opportunity to evaluate and decide whether the project is moving in the right direction. Having these mini releases also allows you to gather more funding because you can release the software, get feedback from your users (or the market), then see if it’s worth getting additional funding for an improved version, or determine whether it’s time to go back to the drawing board. Either way, the agile development process helps you make sure that your company doesn’t sink too much money into software development. The agile methodology does quite the opposite, in fact.

Steve Mezak is founder and CEO of Accelerance, Inc., which helps customers engage the right development team to create high-quality software. Read more and watch videos about using the agile methodology for nearshore software development on the Accelerance blog.

The “Museo de Arqueología del Occidente, Lic. José Parres Arias” located on 16 de Septiembre Av. #889 in downtown Guadalajara, offers exhibitions from pre-Hispanic archeological sites, particularly from the Mexican states of Jalisco, Colima and Nayarit.

The first exhibition area is the Jalisco exhibition, which includes pre-Hispanic clay pieces for domestic use and ceremonial gatherings, as well as sculptures that represented important characters such as gods, as well as common people in their daily routines, executed using different kinds of clay and colors.

You will also see, along with coins used by the native “Los Toltecas” people, pieces of volcanic stone women used to grind corn and other artifacts used to process food. Corn was a very important and precious food in the mid-Americas, and was worshipped in ceremonies and represented by gods.

The Colima Exhibition shows an amazing collection of dog sculptures, vessels and pots, which were found in tombs in agricultural lands in the state of Colima. These sculptures are thought to have been used in religious or ceremonial gatherings, and some even say the natives thought these dogs represented guides for the soul of the dead into the underworld. But their real meaning remains uncertain.

Other clay sculptures represent the witches or “shamans” believed to govern native societies. One collection that really caught my eye were fantastic, 20-foot high figures in the shape of two bodies, attached at their backs, holding with their two heads a great serpent formed in an arc. Some say these figures represent day and night, life and death and rain and drought, since the natives worshipped gods who represented precious commodities such as rain and the sun.

Fauna and flora also played an important role for native societies, and were represented in figures of different colored clay. Plants, for example, were considered deities and certain of their characteristics were attributed to spirits, who could be very powerful and mysterious.

Another important sculpture is of the face of the God of the rain “Tlaloc”, with an expression of fright or even horror, that make it one of the most complex and monumental pieces in the museum.

One of the most interesting pieces is a red clay pot sculpture representing a man resting his head upon his forearms. While the character’s face is hidden because of his position, a close-up photograph shows the face was molded accurately and expresses pain.

The pottery pieces of Nayarit, consisting of pots, bottles and plates, are distinguished by the elegance of their painting and decoration.

Entrance fees are 5 pesos (39 cents $USD). The museum is open 9:30 AM to 1:30 PM and 5:00 PM to 7:00 PM Monday through Friday, and closed Saturdays.

Capgemini, one of the largest multinational IT companies in the world with presence in 40 countries and more than 50 years of experience, will open a subsidiary in Bogotá to offer its services to local clients and subsequently to clients based in other Latin American countries while using Colombia as its regional base of operations.

“Colombia is a key country in our regional expansion strategy; it’s a country experiencing strong growth that has a very capable workforce and a very competitive cost structure. For that reason we decided to open offices here,” said Peter Kroll, Senior Vice President of Capegemini North Latam.

Proexport Colombia facilitated Capgemini’s landing in Colombia; the company will generate 400 jobs in the next two years. “’We look for computer scientists that have graduated from Colombian universities and we train them to provide Capegemini services to national clients and to other clients in the region,” explained Kroll.

“More and more companies from all sectors are requiring IT services, it is a growth industry in Colombia. According to the figures of the Superintendencia de Sociedades y el Ministerio de Tecnologías de la Información y las Comunicaciones, the principle companies in the sector earned around $550 million USD in revenue during 2011,” declared Maria Claudia Lacouture, president of Proexport.

The announcement happened at the 2012 ANDI Outsource Services conference where Kroll emphasized the potential of Colombia as an export platform to the countries that it has free trade agreements with and the opportunity to enter new markets such as the United States.

Capegemini has 108,000 employees worldwide and already has subsidiaries in Brazil, Argentina, Mexico, Guatemala and Chile. They specialize in maintenance of infrastructure and process applications, the implementation of business intelligence systems and ERP among other services.

Proexport, the entity in charge of attracting foreign investment to Colombia, offers services to interested investors such as tailored information in the form of contacts in the public and private sectors, accompaniment and scheduling related to country visits, and continued support to foreign investors that choose Colombia.

By Filipe Pacheco

Stefanini IT Solutions, one of the biggest players in the IT and Outsourcing industry in Brazil, has just made another move towards expansion in Latin America — this time, towards the southern part of the continent. The company founded and managed by Marco Stefanini has now bought Top Systems, one of the biggest producers of core banking software in Uruguay.

The Montevideo-based firm is focused on IT services for financial institutions and already had the Brazilian company as an allied partner. Its main product, called Topaz, is used by financial institutions of different sizes, mainly banks, microcredit institutions and compliance departments. Topaz uses Service Oriented Architecture and Java technology.

“Even though the company is based in Montevideo, their products are utilized throughout Latin America, including Central American countries. For us, it is a strategic move to get closer to clients we do not have today,” Marco Stefanini told Nearshore Americas. The CEO did not disclose how much was spent in the acquisition of Top Systems, which has about 120 employees working from Uruguay today. According to him, the conversations that culminated in the deal lasted for about six months.

Initially, Top Systems will continue to operate with its original name but will use the colors and the logo of the Stefanini.  “But we might change that in the future, we have not thought about it yet,” said Mr. Stefanini, who is in the United States today. He did not disclose financial details of the transaction.

Top Systems was created in 1987 with the aim to generate “innovative technological solutions” for its clients, it is an ISO 9001 certified company. Besides its headquarters in Uruguay, the company also has an office in Lima. Its main competitor in the domestic market is Bantotal.

“With expertise in this market and with the 20 biggest Brazilian banks as clients today, Stefanini complements its offering in core banking, providing access to institutions of any size,” says Marcos Monteiro, Business Consulting director at Stefanini. Today, financial markets represent 33% of the revenues of the company, and more than 90% of the private banks in Brazil are served by the firm.

On April 26th, Top Systems announced a partnership with Stefanini to serve a Brazilian client called Banco Coperativo Sicredi – a financial organization focused on cooperation entities that is very strong in funding in the Southern States of Brazil, especially Rio Grande do Sul, which borders Uruguay.

The Uruguayan perspective

“This is an important move for the Uruguayan software industry as a whole,” comments MarioTucci, partner in MVD Consulting, a boutique business consulting firm that specializes in change and operations management, as well as globalization strategies for multinational companies.

He explains that even though the banking industry is considerably small in comparison to that of Brazil, the local software companies have specialized themselves to provide core financial systems technology in many Latin countries, and are quite a reference when it comes to financial software production in the region.

Another positive point of the acquisition says Tucci, is the strengthening of the Latin American market as a whole, and the closer contact between regional companies to develop the regional software market, “that way they can compete with Indian and American peers,” he adds.

“Just recently foreign investors started to consider players in the Uruguayan market, which has always been formed mostly by local companies. But there is a moment when they need scale to grow, and these investments are welcome for that,” Tucci said in an interview with Sourcing Brazil.  “At the same time, Brazilian companies seek to expand abroad, they need to.”

Another positive point of the acquisition says Tucci, is the strengthening of the Latin American market as a whole, and the closer contact between regional companies to develop the regional software market, “that way they can compete with Indian and American peers,” he adds.

Ready for new acquisitions

“We are currently in conversations with other potential companies that can be purchased around the region. Those talks are always happening,” said Stefanini.  This is the second company from the IT financial sector that Stefanini has bought in less than six months. At the end of last year, the company bought Orbitall, the IT branch of Itaú, one of the biggest private banks in Brazil.

Within one year between 2010 and 2011, Stefanini acquired two firms in the United States (TechTeam and CXI), and one in Colombia (Informática & Tecnología).  “Moments of crisis are the best ones to grow, when the really good opportunities come up,” remarked Stefanini in an interview with Sourcing Brazil in May, 2011.

With the acquisition of CXI, Stefanini expanded its capacity to offer American clients services in staff augmentation, turnkey IT solutions, end-to-end ERP services, and functional sourcing. It also reinforces the alliance with SAP that CXI has had since 2006, which makes Stefanini a SAP certified partner in the United States.

Medellin is one of those cities that you never want to leave. Blessed with mountains on all sides,  a Mediterranean climate and some of the best beef dishes anywhere in Colombia (especially when over a barbeque), Medellin is shaking loose from the shackles of its past and putting a remarkable amount of focus on global services. We spent a few days there last week – and got to know how the Paisas people see Colombia’s second biggest city evolving as a hub for innovation and global engagement.