Advantages and Disadvantages of Offshore Software Development Services

Before we begin, it’s worth mentioning that we’ve reviewed the pros and cons of offshore software development services from the lens of a company that builds tech teams in Eastern Europe and Latin America. Working with clients primarily from North America and Western Europe, we’ve retained some useful insights along the way that have aided us in the creation of this article. 

Eastern Europe and Latin America (LATAM) are ripe with companies specialized in nearshore and offshore development services that introduce an excellent opportunity for European and North American companies to build an external stronghold of engineering excellence. Both locations provide excellent nearshore and offshore opportunities. Since you’re here, we believe that you’re aware of such an opportunity but are still weighing the nearshore vs. offshore software development services. In today’s post, we take a deep dive into this matter to analyze some of the positives and potential negatives of developing your product with an offshore team, so you can make an informed decision when choosing between nearshoring vs. offshoring. 

READ ALSO: Your Guide to Offshore vs. Nearshore Product Development Comparison 

Advantages of offshore development services 

Quality tech talent

As a North American company, you’ve probably noticed an intensified tech talent gap in recent years. To add salt to the wound, you may also be grappling with tech giants poaching the best IT talent, leaving you to scrape the bottom of the barrel when it comes to attracting quality engineers in your region. Due to the power of globalization, nearshore and offshore product development services allow you to level the playing field in that competition. That leads us to our next point when your choice is down to nearshoring vs. offshoring. 

Nearshore vs. offshore: Talent diversity

Offshore development services, for example, our team at nCube, can help you staff your squad with cream-of-the-crop talent. In fact, many organizations see Eastern Europe and LATAM as rich repositories of tech skills, ranging from generic technologies (such as Python, JavaScript, PHP, etc.) to niche skills (AI, Blockchain, IoT). Most engineers in these regions have vast experience augmenting IT teams from the US and Canada. Thus, it’s easy to find people when it comes to expertise, tech skills, and language proficiency.

READ ALSO: IT Outsourcing Market in Latin America: An Overview

Fast team formation 

When you have a lot of available candidates, you have a higher likelihood of building your team fast in both nearshore vs offshore

models. When it comes to Eastern Europe and LATAM, the demand vs. supply ratio is more than reasonable. With nearly 2 million developers combined on the market, the regions’ IT markets are more than ready to back you up when you need to bring in extra hands urgently. We at nCube are in an excellent position to get your team off the ground on short notice, given that we’re an established employer capable of attracting top talent skilled in a wide range of technologies. On average, we can build a standard team of developers in 3-4 weeks, which further validates the markets’ team extension capabilities.

Nearshore vs. offshore: Cost-saving

If you’re up against the soaring expenses associated with a home-based team, offshore software development services let you prune unnecessary costs. When it comes to offshore development services, you can count on flat-rate pricing where you only pay for the hours your full-time employee has worked out in a month. This way, you let the vendor of the service carry the weight of other expenses, such as setting up IT infrastructure for your team, office space, employee retention, and a variety of benefits, including weekly team-building events, health insurance, and paid vacation time. 

READ ALSO: How to Reduce IT Development Costs 

Improved focus

Development is only a part of the process. As you know, a big chunk of work also goes into research, marketing, and business analysis, which can make or break your company. That’s not to say development is inconsequential. Offshore development services emphasize your control over the engineering process. At the same time, your team will be an autonomous unit, which your nearshore or offshore vendor will support by taking care of employee retention, motivation, bonuses, and such. This way, you don’t have to deal with team administration when you add resources to your tech unit, which lets you concentrate on your core business goals. 

Driving innovation 

Offshore software development services can bring a fresh perspective to the table. Thus, if you lack technical know-how in-house, offshore development services can be a good solution to bring in the needed expertise. As a result of collaboration with offshore vs. nearshore companies, you will get an intuitive, easy-to-use, and scalable product. We at nCube, for example, always focus on sourcing skilled engineers who help our clients find the best tech solution there is. 

READ ALSO: Offshore Development Center vs. In-House Team: Which one is Best for You?

Disadvantages of offshore development services 

Possible communication barriers 

Although remote communication is the norm these days, running a team from afar requires a well-thought-out approach. Even with a wealth of messengers at hand, it can be hard to build effective cross-border communication. Tools such as Slack, Trello, Asana reign supreme in remote collaboration, including nearshore and offshore units. You can go with Zoom, Hangouts, or Skype for your live team sessions, and all of them are pretty easy to use. However, even with great tools at hand, the time zone difference usually comes into play when you work with offshore software development services. The fewer common working hours your teams have, the harder it would be to find the window for meetings and synchronization. As such, you need to find the right approach to overcome these challenges. 

Nearshore vs. offshore: Cultural differences

Another barrier that you may find hard to handle is connected to cultural differences. Although Eastern European mentality is closer to Western (especially compared to Eastern cultures), it may take some time to adjust to cultural peculiarities in communication associated with the culture, given that some things can get lost in translation. Thus, it takes an additional effort to make sure your teams are on the same wavelength. You may need to avoid inconsistencies in communication by writing extensive meeting notes and communicating thoroughly. If you can make adjustments in communication and commit to the process, then going with offshore software development services will benefit your company. 

Additional oversight

Nearshore and offshore teams may require more control and communication than a home-based squad. Using offshore development services suggests keeping team communication and development processes under control personally. It means that the client needs to make some effort to coordinate the project and team collaboration as effectively as their in-house teams. Therefore using offshore software development services isn’t the best idea for those who aren’t ready to take control over processes and are looking for someone to handle most of the management on their behalf.

READ ALSO: How to Manage Distributed Engineering Teams

How nCube’s model of offshore software development services works

Our model is here to help you make the most of offshore software development services. Here’s what our approach includes:

A personal touch

We help you provide developers that match your requirements in the best way possible. We maintain a custom approach when it comes to building the right kind of team and go the extra mile to meet your tech and communication skills requirements.

A no-middleman approach

In our model, you’ll communicate with developers directly, retaining the development process control. This way, your offshore team becomes a part of your organization, supplementing your home-based squad. 

Only skilled candidates 

We provide an opportunity for you to scale your project with cream-of-the-crop talent, as all developers you’ll interview have undergone our internal screening process. On top of that, the Ukrainian IT market is studded with quality engineers with experience working at offshore software development services, which means excellent English skills and domain experience. 

Let’s connect to discuss whether or not nearshore and offshore development services are a good solution for you and how we at nCube can help you build an offshore team.