* Grading U.S., Russia, China and others as research candidates
Lately, I’ve been corresponding with an Indian reader of mine who has taken issue with the things I’ve written about India. He thinks that I and other writers are negative on India. I’m not against using Indian capabilities. I merely think companies should make decisions based upon the best foreseeable outcome.
Outsourcing – especially offshoring – decisions represent serious commitments to coping with long-distance relationships, language barriers, and political and economic uncertainty. Cutting costs is not the only consideration business leaders should consider when examining offshoring vs. farmsourcing (outsourcing to domestic impoverished or depressed areas) – or at least keeping one’s activities isolated to their continent.
Lest I lead people to conclude that I’m completely pro-America when it comes to offshoring topics, let me address a news article my reader friend sent me. Then let’s go through a crude table-napkin style grading exercise to see what the best options are.
The article, for your reference, talks about Motorola building an applied research lab to study physical networks, autonomic computing and other elements of interest with next-generation networks. This lab will be the 11th in the Motorola Labs array. Motorola intends to locate the facility in Bangalore, India. See https://www.motorola.com/mediacenter/news/detail/0,,5415_5406_23,00.html for more info.
I applaud this idea, and think India is one of the two best choices for a research-facility of this ilk (a close runner-up is Israel). Putting ourselves in the shoes of the Motorola executives, let’s look at the options and develop a grading matrix by which we can evaluate the best location choice for this new lab. Here’s how I see other choices stacking up. I’d love to know what you think.
U.S. – Grade: D. It appears the top two job openings throughout the U.S. are for nurses, and engineers (especially software engineers). Go to any major newspaper in America and you’ll see pages upon pages of ads for these two career types. There simply aren’t enough engineers to go around. So the U.S. is probably out if we’re serious about developing a top-quality R&D campus.
Russia – Grade: D. While Russia has high-quality engineers and scientists the current political climate is sketchy.
China – Grade: C. Supplies numerous goods to the U.S. – recent trade numbers show the U.S./China trade deficit rising in favor of China. This country too, has high quality engineers and scientists but again the political climate may be too iffy.
Vietnam, Latin America – Grade: C. Leaders are anxious to work with U.S. corporations, but the Latin American education infrastructure might not have enough hard-sciences graduates to support a top-grade engineering environment. Vietnam is an up-and-comer with educated folks, but the infrastructure may not be there to support a high-output engineering campus.
Japan, Australia, Canada, Europe – Grade: C. The quality and quantity of engineers is sufficient, but the cost of doing business in these countries probably won’t help us arrive at our goal of high-quality engineering efforts with minimal costs.
Eastern Europe – Grade: B. The caliber of available engineering expertise is there, as is the willingness on the part of leaders to work with the U.S., but again the political climate may present some issues. Also, there might be imposing language barriers.
Israel – Grade: A. Top grade engineers coupled with friendly U.S. relations makes this a great offshoring choice for engineering activities. Cost savings may be somewhat less attractive than India. English is a popular language.
India – Grade: A. Powerful engineering expertise alongside inexpensive costs for doing business. Language is predominantly English, though sometimes difficult for a westerner to understand. Indians are friendly, hard-working, knowledgeable and thorough.
What do you think? Send me an e-mail at mailto:bheldman@enterprisemanagement.com
