…or why Ukraine is the perfect outsourcing country for Western Europe.

As we can see nowadays, nearshore and offshore software development is something that more and more software development companies are looking into. Leaving alone all the advantages and benefits of outsourcing (which, I am sure, you are quite well informed about), one important thing when thinking about outsourcing is the selection of the best strategic partner for your business, which of course starts from selecting a proper offshore location.

It’s time to start picking the “shore”, and like with grocery shopping it would be most logical to start with the nearest supermarket. My firm belief is that outsourcing from Western to Eastern Europe is the most reliable and effective option for now due to low risk and still pretty high price difference. Actually, if you need a creative and innovative team of developers (not just coders) for a reasonable cost, than Eastern Europe is the only right choice. Particularly, I am speaking about Ukraine.

As you might know, Ukraine is situated in the heart of Europe and is the second largest European country. Being close to EU countries geographically, it is found in the same time zone (GMT +2), has similar mentality and very good education (as you remember, people of the former Soviet Union possess an extremely high level of technical and scientific expertise).

Interesting fact: for the second year in a row (2007, 2008), Gartner’s research included Ukraine to the top 30 countries for Offshore IT Outsourcing. Gartner has assessed the suitability of 72 countries as offshore locations, and has announced its ‘Top 30′.

Gartner used ten criteria that it determined important for organizations to consider when looking at a potential location for offshore or nearshore IT or business process services. They were: language, government support, labor pool, infrastructure, educational system, cost, political and economic environment, cultural compatibility, global and legal maturity, and data and intellectual property security and privacy.

The fact that Ukraine was included to the top list once again speaks to the fact that it continues to attract its mature neighborhood such as EU and the Nordic regions as a high quality and low cost services provider.

I can’t tell what shore is going to be the best for you, but one thing I am sure of – choose it wisely. The country selection needs to be taken exceptionally serious as it is one of the most important decisions you take in the vendor selection process. We are free to a point of choice, after that the choice controls the chooser.

by Anna Shevchenko is a business development expert in Binary Studio