Stefanini buys Uruguayan Company ‘Top Systems’
May 17th, 2012
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.
By Leonardo Mattiazzi
Agile has been largely regarded as an ideal fit for today’s business challenges (for a reference, check the Forrester Research Feb. 2012 report, “Determine The Business And IT Impact Of Agile Development”).
And, from our experience, the business benefit of using Agile is magnified when it is coupled with the application of Lean principles, such as establishing a continuous flow of constant throughput. This principle, known as heijunka in the Lean vernacular, when applied to software development means creating a continuous delivery model, with a fixed-size team that undertakes several different projects one after another (of course, using Agile methods in each one of them). By doing so, we are able to eliminate several different sources of waste, and significantly decrease the actual cost of these projects (in our estimates, by at least 25% in the long run), as well …
Why High-Performance Teams are Critical to Nearshore Project Success: Employee Traits to Cultivate & Why They Matter PART II
April 25th, 2012By Leonardo Mattiazzi
In the first part of this post, I explained how the mass production of software, while initially seemed to improve efficiency, ultimately value to the industry, also laid the foundation for the “software factory” trend. To move away from this model, organizations should seek out Nearshore providers with their own high-performance teams that possess the aforementioned qualities of talent and skills mastery. In this post I will share the final three traits of the high-performance team, and how Nearshore teams can encourage these traits within their organization.
Autonomy
Giving professionals the room to work autonomously can bolster the team’s commitment to each other and to a project’s overall success. It instills a sense of reliance and trust in each team member, helping each person to identify their own unique strengths and understand their role within the team. This will ultimately give each person a sense of responsibility and ownership over …
Uribe Declares New Day for Nearshore at Nexus
April 19th, 2012
Uribe highlighted positive social, political and business developments in the Latin American/Caribbean region
Kirk Laughlin, CEO of Nearshore Americas, kicked off today’s Nearshore Nexus Conference at the Crowne Plaza in New York City by stating nearshore outsourcing has gone from “novel to mainstream.” Laughlin promised that conference speakers would illustrate how outsourcing destinations in Latin America and the Caribbean are “no longer in the shadow of India or China,” but have instead become vibrant providers of sophisticated IT and business outsourcing services in their own right. The first speaker, former President of the Republic of Colombia Mr. Alvaro Uribe, delivered on that promise.
Mon Dieu! Montreal’s Tech Entrepreneurs Target Design and Multimedia
April 13th, 2012By Luke Bujarski
Montreal’s recent start-up boom is putting Quebec Province on the map as a social media and cloud-driven innovation hub. What used to be a conservative tech city hosting primarily ‘big’ IT including Research in Motion and Nortel Networks is quickly rebranding itself as a top-shelf start-up ecosystem. Companies like Ateneo Digital, Bespoke Mobility, and Art Sumo are just three of what could soon be global household names sprouting out of Montreal. The tech community in Montreal also draws parallels between Silicon Valley in terms of city size, educational resources, and cultural diversity.
Why High-Performance Teams are Critical to Nearshore Project Success: The “Software Factory” and a New Way of Thinking
April 9th, 2012By Leonardo Mattiazzi, Vice President, International Business for Ci&T
At the advent of the industry, writing software was an individual’s task. This was clear as the developer’s touch was all over the final product. But over time, that personal touch seemingly disappeared. As the industry evolved, software was called upon to solve increasingly larger problems, computers got smaller and the task of development became too large for a single individual. It fast became a team sport and processes were put in place to make the development more efficient.
The growth of the industry was of course a good thing, resulting in flourishing project management, new collaboration tools and the creation of processes to ensure adherence to standards. As a result, today Nearshore teams can work with clients to deliver cost-effective projects quickly and efficiently.
But during the process of standardization, which followed in the footsteps of mass production in manufacturing, something was lost. …
To Capitalize on IT Consumerization, Shore Up Your Mobility Strategy
January 19th, 2012In my previous post, I discussed how IT consumerization – the introduction of consumer devices into the workplace – is already having a significant impact on Nearshore software development as CIOs rush to capitalize on the trend. But adapting to new devices alone isn’t enough. To truly get the most out of their consumerization efforts, companies have begun to incorporate Mobile Device Management (MDM) and Mobile Application Management (MAM) into their enterprise mobility strategies.
Mobile Device Management and Mobile Application Management have emerged as real solutions for companies seeking to harness IT consumerization while keeping control over the consumer devices used in the workplace and the applications that reside on them. These solutions, which include offerings from companies like AirWatch and Sybase (Afaria), enable IT to secure employee-owned iOS or Android devices, while ensuring adherence to corporate policies and approved use of …
Sourcing Motown? Detroit Aims to Be an IT Hub
January 16th, 2012
"Spirit of Detroit" sculpture in downtown Motown.
By Dennis Barker
Is another player shaping up to compete with Latin American IT outsourcing companies? Proponents of America’s former Car Capital of the World want to transform that struggling city into a technology center that can deliver software to businesses currently outsourcing work to the Nearshore and other offshore locations like India. They say that American sourcing companies based in or near Motor City can compete even on cost with other countries.
Nearshore Needs More Training, Greater Scale
January 11th, 2012By Patrick Haller
Shanker: India has a better grasp of "the training concept."
The prospect of managing multiple locations in the US, India, Mexico and Japan can be daunting for many people. But Ravi Shanker, Sales Director for HCL America, Inc., has been doing it for years. His experience overseeing IT development projects began with Polaris Software in the early 2000s, then with HCL. As an insider, he has been directly involved in a market that has shifted from Indian-centric software development to new destinations like Brazil and Mexico. We asked Shanker about the current state of outsourcing, the trend toward onshoring, and what countries need to do to remain relevant or become more competitive.
Nearshore Nexus 2012: Bigger, Bolder and Coming to Broadway
January 11th, 2012The most exclusive outsourcing event of the year comes to New York City, April 19. Buy-side executives (including vendor management, IT, BPO, site selection and software leaders) are invited to attend.
