Pakistan, A Popular Outsourcing Destination?

Having travelled and done business extensively in Pakistan it is a correct observation that the scenario in that country changes rapidly, sometime for better and sometime for worse.
However, what is generally overlooked in the media is the complexity of Pakistan as a nation. Although the country has recently been engaged in military operations these are largely a phenomenon limited to the border areas along its north western border with Afghanistan. The rest of Pakistan (particularly the Eastern part) is relatively peaceful inspite of the increased violence recently. The Eastern parts of Pakistan also have good infrastructure, well developed industry, and a large pool of educated people with good language skills. Hence, it is natural that international companies will tap into this resource and that Pakistan over the years will become an outsourcing destination - although I'm sure it will require more socio-political stability that is currently observed.

Pakistani people are highly educated people especially in Lahore, Islamabad and karachi. Investing/outsourcing in IT sector is the best option..

Pakistan is an un-discovered high tech outsourcing destination. It has over 70% mobile phone penetration and nearly ubiquitous internet access, including wireless internet in all urban centers.

There are some very good engineering universities teaching research-based courses. Universities have invested in high tech equipment like Linux clusters for parallel supercomputing, etc. Open source software competes with licensed software, with entire banks switched over to Linux.

The skill base is very strong in Oracle, TCP/IP, Cisco, Windows Server Administration, web security, etc. Many qualified engineers are hired in the Middle East. Wage rates are very competitive and the people are hard-working. A very innovative approach is followed as against routine work.

Do look at Pakistan to outsource some of your innovative, leading-edge work.

Nice mockery of the rating agency. Wonder why afghanistan and iraq dont figure on this list.

I was also very surprised to see Pakistan rated so high on A.T. Kearney’s assessment. However, I disagree that companies are increasingly willing to overlook violence and security as critical factors in selecting an outsourcing location. As the head of Capgemini’s BPO in North America, I work with clients each day on their decision to outsource in particular locations. I would say clients are increasingly concerned about stability and in fact are demanding a portfolio approach – allowing a mix of onshore, offshore and sometimes nearshore outsourcing locations in order to manage risk factors such as violence, security and political unrest. When it comes to outsourcing, it’s rarely about the cheapest price - companies are willing and do pay for a stable environment.

Alijandro, thanks so much for your perspective. It is often true that one part of a country can experience violence and upheaval and another part can be relatively peaceful. From what I've heard this is also the case in Mexico. What would signal to you that the stability of the country had deterioriated beyond the borders? Is there anything in particular that companies should be watching?

Raz & HighTechPakistan, Thanks so much for your comments. I will continue to keep an eye on Pakistan as an IT outsourcing destination. If you know of any large companies that are currently outsourcing work there, please let me know.

David, I wasn't trying to mock A.T. Kearney, I was simply surprised that Pakistan was rated so highly given the instability of parts of that country. In general, I find that this outsourcing ranking A.T. Kearney does is painstakingly researched. So, I wondered in this case whether companies are indeed starting to take a closer look at Pakistan when making outsourcing decisions and, if so, how much concern executives have for the political stability of the country.

Thanks for your perspective, David Poole. I don't think companies are willing to overlook stability altogether but I think their risk tolerance is higher than what I would have imagined.

It seems that plenty of companies are still willing to outsource to Mexico, for example, even though the violence has been well documented there. I understand that the violence has, for the most part, been concentrated in border areas in Mexico and that outsourcing operations largely exist in other parts of the country.

I find it fascinating how companies determine risk and how they factor in all the variables in outsourcing decisions.

Pakistan was also British colony. Schools,colleges and universities are par with India.The problem is not only with the security situation but image problem.Pakistan has to work on its image.It is not small task , they mush rein the fundamentalist ,Army and state their goals clearly.It can take time if you think of visiting Pakistan, events like beheading Daniel Pearl bring nightmares.
Thanks,
Sarabjit Mann

I have also traveled extensively in Pakistan. It is true that Pakistan has been in news for all the wrong reasons. It is also true that most of that country is relatively peaceful. Pakistan has invested heavily on infrastructure in the last 10 years. It has a large pool of educated people with advance skills in IT, Accounting and Medical. I am not all surprised by A.T. Kearney’s assessment. Rachael King unfortunately seems to be one of those Americans who have no idea whats happening in the rest of the world.

Thorsten
Germany

Pakistan is one the most lucrative market for outsourcing hub.

If India could be an outsourcing hub than why cant Pakistan be? There is much more violence which goes unnoticed by media but yet IT industry works fine there.

PAKISTAN Industry needs just a bit push up when then the Pakistani will see FDI and growth opportunities in this area, they will do their best to safeguard this sector.

Dont forget that Pakistani are extremely talented people who are not yet given a chance. It could be that we revolutionize the entire IT sector by selecting Pakistan as our choice.

Recently, I was working on a low tech center and what I've have found that Pakistan's major cities such as Karachi, Lahore and Islamabad are good options for outsourcing. These three major cities have inexpensive educated work force, good infrastructure, less violence and international airports. Another, good thing about Pakistanis that their English speaking folks accents is not thick in compare to other Asian or Middle Eastern countries which is very important when it comes to live customer support. Labor cost is also a good bargain if we compare to other South Asian countries which really superseded risk factor when it comes to choose a right country for outsourcing. If any one interested in outsourcing to Pakistan, please check the following link which is really helpful to make a right decision
http://www.pseb.org.pk/page.php?detail=news

Pakistan's CGI industry, is really getting popular these days, specially after winning an Oscar by Mir Zafar Ali for best visual effects from movie the golden compass in 2007, the Pakistani cgi is being really in a great demand by most popular gaming, architectures, and movie industries, so many movies have been derived from pakistani cgi outsourcing by Hollywood movies. People like Amaan Akramm, and Muqeem Khan had worked for so many great movies and gaming areas from us and uk markets. How ever Pakistani cgi artist learned every thing by their own in the beginning but now professional institutes are been made to produce more professional cgi artists, one of the most popular is Iqra University started in 1998 and its cgi labs is one of the greatest and state of the art labs in Pakistan.

What you guys fail to realize is that instability may not be directly proportional to the availability of technical pool. In the last 10 years, there have been accelerated developments in education:science and technology in Pakistan. The number of PHDs that we produce now is much much much higher than we ever did. Now, you can see many contibutions from Pakistan in scientific journals. Infact, there are 27 Pakistani scientist contibuting to the Hadron Collider project such as Professor Hafeez Hoorani. Besides this, Pakistan contributed $10 million for this project.

Pakistan has instable politics but Pakistan DOES NOT have anarchy. Italy is the same. The situation of security is worse in one area, bad in other and excellent in other. But it is NOT a collapse of Pakistan. You don't understand the resilience of Pakistanis. We have suffered lot more terroristic actions from India, Russia, USA since last 30 years than the entire western world but we deal with it. Inspite of this we continue to go to our businesses, schools, and jobs.

SO I highly encourage you guys to outsource to Pakistan. The labour is pretty darn cheap right now. It won't remain so for too long.

I can guarantee you ONE THING, even if there is war, Pakistanis will DELIVER.

We have been reporting on Pakistan's growth as a player in the outsourcing and technology market for some time now. Clients that come to Pakistan are pleasantly surprised by its great talent and competitive pricing and quality of work. Pakistan is a complex country, like India and China and holds a similar economic promise. Companies that can tolerate the perceived risks now, and come as customers and partners will reap rewards in the future.
Not to do a marketing plug, but our blog that tracks the Pakistani Tech industry is here :
http://www.ittazee.com
also, you can see http://buzz.ittazee.com which tracks citizen journalism on technology and other spheres in Pakistan. these report the daily innovations that many tend to overlook thanks to the noise and nuisance value of issues like the Taliban

At Techlahore.wordpres.com we've been covering Pakistan's progress in the IT space for several years now. We've met with executives from dozens of western companies who come to Pakistan with apprehensions (thanks to the media!), but leave quite amazed by the reality.

Anyone who has been to Lahore, Karachi, Islamabad or Pakistan's other major cities discovers good infrastructure, progressive metropolises, millions of educated young people entering the workforce, innovative companies, excellent s&t universities, low costs of doing business and finally - despite the rhetoric about 'security' - an easier environment to do business in than most other offshore destinations.

Give the mainstream media some time to get over its obsession with the mythical, 8-headed 'Taliban' monster and the positive developments that have taken place in Pakistan over the last decade will come to light.

I am the CEO of a fast growing IT Services firm called iNVATERRA. We are a Dallas , Texas based firm that has selected Pakistan to base our offshore delivery center in. I have 12+ years building captive centers in India, Poland, Ireland, Mexico and Chile. From a talent pool perspective I can tell you that building our delivery center in Pakistan has been the best decision we have taken. The available educated and trained resource pool is large, salaries are contained, retention rates are high and employees are not hopping around from one company to another, English fluency is abundant, accent neutralization is easy due to the fact that English is not as much as second language as it is in India therefore the English accents are not indigenous and being able to speak it remains a privilege of the lower middle and above classes. The infrastructure of Karachi and Lahore for example are far superior then of Bangalore for example. The government provides ample benefits to the IT sector in the form of subsidized rent, tax exemptions, and even subsidized interns.

David Poole I still do agree with you that larger customers especially those that CG would approach may be apprehensive to Outsourcing to Pakistan because of the perception of the security situation there and the fact that executives would rather not assume the risk at the end of the day. Saying that I can assure you that those customers in the mid-market and SMB arena and those that have utilized companies using Pakistani resources are pleasantly surprised. Most of our customers are referrals.

Unfortunately most people in the West have preconceived perceptions of what life and security is like in Pakistan therefore we spend a considerable time educating our customers. Should Cap Gemini want to consider a Captive Center in Pakistan as Bearing Point, IBM or companies such as iNVATERRA have please let me know and I can gladly send you a presentation of the benefits of outsourcing to Pakistan. You can email me at khurram.farooquie@invaterra.com or look us up at www.invaterra.com.

Outsourcing at the end of the day is about utilizing resources in underprivileged countries where we can marry the available benefits to our customer's needs and Pakistan, being a developing nation with high availability of such benefits and low demand because of the perception is ideally poised to continue in going up the AT Kearney rating scale, despite the perceived ground level situation there.

I have this say this, that its the right time to project Pakistan as an un-discovered high tech outsourcing destination. Pakistan is very much in strong position when it comes to IT/ITES, including telecommunication usage and implementation.

Education industry also is shaping up to the current international standards, with many private and public sector universities projecting courseoutlines directly provided to them by Microsoft, Cisco, and Siemens. There are 37 Microsoft Gold Certified Partners (Microsoft's higest level of Partnership in the Microsoft Partner Program), only in Karachi, and the number keeps on increasing.

Karachi, Lahore and Islamabad are rapidly developing into great IT hubs, with huge investments in cities been seen everywhere, especially Karachi.

At present the outsourcing rate for provision of resources and IT project based outsourcing to Middleeast is way much faster, less expensive and very resilient as compared to India.

The most important point that must not be overlooked is that Pakistan is actually helping and assisting US in the war against terror, hence US and Pakistan are working side by side for the country's war, and the country's upliftment. Also, the investment sector is very seperate from the current political atmosphere, and major investments from all around the world can be seen even at this time in Pakistan.

Its high time for the west to realize that Pakistan is the right place to invest.

Rachael, We are a small company of 10 people but are providing services to fortune 1000 companies in US. Dealing in Pharma and Financial sectors. There are many more here dealing with Pakistani companies...check following sites for more info: www.pseb.org.pk avd pasha.org.pk

The key cities of Pakistan have strong technical infrastructure and provide opportunities for IT companies to offer un-interrupted services to customers all over the world.

There is a large pool of well educated, English speaking & tech savvy work force.

The companies focus on quality to offset negative factors and attract foreign contracts.

Having read all the comments above & not ignoring the reality of my country I admit the ineligibility of my Government on ongoing phenomenon of terrorism, military operation, overthrown of institutions, radical opinions, violence & instability. Yes, we can’t deny the facts but there is also a Strong Need to allow world to understand the good side.

Certainly, I can’t tell what shore is going to be the best; it could be different from what is the best for some. But one thing; saying it wisely. It’s always evident that outsourcing to Asian countries is advantageous when compared to rest of the globe.

So why should YOU particularly outsource to Pakistan? To begin with, we have equally large knowledge pool but what makes us different is the true proficiency of worker in almost every field; IT services, BPO, Software development are name to few. Other factors for us being the obvious place for outsourcing is the skilled affordable hardworking quality labor.

No doubt, here the government policies should be more encouraging for IT industry; more than heading seminars, expos, IT parks etc. But no doubts the private sector has been always working consistently in building up infrastructure & delivering best to the industry. We do have much acclaimed outsourcing providers that provide entire range of high quality technology services across the globe.

No doubt, Pakistan is on top of the global outsourcing opportunity & going to have the most excellent investment potential in coming years.

Outsource to Pakistan; get access to specialized services & give your business a competitive edge

--ali muslim
http://alimuslim.blogspot.com/

Pakistanis has contributed a fair share in the field of IT. I covered it 2 years back on my blog.

http://kadnan.com/blog/2007/08/14/pakistans-60th-birthday-pakistanis-in-the-field-of-ita-tribute/

It is true that the dynamics in Pakistan seem complex to some but that's how transitions take place. The world history is full of such examples.

We are moving towards becoming a brand from a product and the development phase shows mixed signs. It is imperative to note that the elements for a successful brand image are present and we are evolving a Right MIX.

Experiences... turning right

Thats Correct, and i believe that Pakistan is going to be one of the Biggest Outsourcing Hub for Software, Application and other IT Relevent Development Industry. Most of the famour application development like Microsoft, Apple (iPhone), etc is now under development in Pakistan.

Pakistani IT Companies Participating and expanding their Partners in USA, Canada, Malaysia, Singapore, UAE, Saudi Arabia and other major parts of the world.

I believe in 2010 the rate of outsourcing in Pakistan will definitly increase.

Regards,
Zohaib Khan
CEO, A2Z Creatorz Inc.
www.a2zcreatorz.com

While working for last nine years in IT industry both locally and globally, I have realized that Pakistan is obviously becoming an attractive outsourcing destination. Besides availability of quality HR, and many ISO/CMMI rated companies, the telecom revolution in Pakistan and demanding costs of neighboring country's HR are in favor of Pakistan. I remember Gartner rating Pakistan amongst the tier one of outsourcing countries in its 2008 report.(http://www.pseb.org.pk/page.php?prid=39).

My company also works for many American and Canadian Clients and I personally now many Pakistani IT companies having their products being run on top-o-the- line US and Gulf corporations. Obviously it’s unfair to compare Pakistan with market leaders who are not only enjoy the benefit of being first entrant but have also strong and mature global network.

Either it Business Week or Economist, be it Washington Post, Forbes or CIO, all agree that despite all odds, entrepreneurs think out of box about cost-competitiveness and quality as a major factors – and that’s why they are ENTERPRENURES.

Pakistan’s outsourcing service providers are vigilant about redundancy, reliability and integrity, thanks in part to instability on the national level. Call it over-compensation or hyper-sensitivity. Or the Avis ‘we try harder’ approach.

Having worked and traveled across Pakistan, I have never felt in any sort of danger – except in a car going through a busy intersection in Karachi. If people would actually visit Pakistan, they would quickly see the tremendous advantages that the private sector in that country offers.

On the other side of the border to the east, I’ve spent several nights on the floor with a mattress propped up to block whatever might come through the windows. General strikes, bomb blasts, power outages, communal conflicts, extreme water shortages, traffic gridlock, and a myriad of other challenges make India a much higher risk destination than is generally acknowledged. Oh yes, and India is not shy about jailing IT managers from U.S. companies (like eBay) over disputes that would not merit a parking ticket in the U.S.

Pakistan’s tax holidays are the envy of the region. So too is the quality of the labor force, which is not overstretched and exhibits low turnover and high loyalty and personal integrity.

Faced with rising costs and personnel shortages, Indian companies could become the largest employers in Pakistan’s IT, BPO and call center industries within the next seven to ten years. They would be foolish not to.

David Poole, Rachael:

Being a Pakistani with 3 advance degrees from the US and running successful entrepreneurship enterprises in Pakistan, I am actually questioning the #20 rating.I think we should be closer to top 10. Here is the gist of my thought process:

Pakistan is rated as top 3 destination for low risk IT outsourcing on sites such as RAC, ODesk & ELance. The feedback is as good as it gets for the a developing nation.

There are more than 1 reasons why a country rated top 3 goes to top 20 for about the similar type of technology work. But the most important is probably security. So the ranking agency has not over-looked this fact and incorporated that, just like Fortune 500 Organizations would.

It is debatable whether we should go from 3 to 20, or 15, or 10. But the overall IT infrastructure in Pakistan is extremely positive for outsourcing, specially in top tier cities (Karachi, Lahore Islamabad, and most of Northern Punjab) where you can get city wide wireless broadband via USB dongle for 20-25 USD a month. The roads are fantastic. Electricity is not an issue due to investment in private generators and UPS systems.

The infrastructure is lot better than what you will observe in most cities of India, which is currently ranked at top.

I hope I made some sense.

Hi Rachael,

Did you think using the image of Pakistan from Flickr? Invite you to:

http://www.flickr.com/search/?q=Karachi

I moved back to Pakistan six years ago to setup the offshore development facility for US based Internet media company. Our total cost savings on creating our first product was 18X what we would have spent doing the same thing in Silicon Valley.

Although our initial efforts were based on creating Web 2.0 products for the US market, Pakistan's internal growth has been so compelling that we are now focused on serving the local market. We run Pakistan's largest job portal, ROZEE.PK, which is used by over 19,000 employers. A recent Morgan Stanley study showed Pakistan as being the third fastest growing Internet user population globally. In 2007, Pakistan had the fastest growing mobile subscriber base in the world. The Internet penetration rate is higher than India and strong strides have been made in strengthening infrastructure.

While the instability in the country's northern area have dominated news coverage, there is an attractive arbitrage opportunity to capitalize on the perception vs. reality on the ground divide to access thousands of cost effective highly talented software engineers. We have four offices in different cities in Pakistan -- we have not had a single day of outage or loss of productivity due to any geopolitical instability.

From www.askbajwa.com, I would still say that despite the position of the region on the index, there is more Non-Resident to Home Country outsourcing going on then actual West to East corporate outsourcing. Organizations from the West would continue to find the country's situation unstable in terms of social and economic progress and the issue of violence is the main reason to turn away. The energy crisis in the region in all its urban and non-urban regions will continue to be a put-off till the end of this year. However, in the next two years, the situation may be very different and the index situation may also be very improved.

Outsourcing operation is concentrated in large Urban cities Karachi (15m), Lahore(7m) and Islamabad/Rawalpindi(4m).

All of these are far from borders, like Karachi is 2000KM away.

Report is correct. Pakistan has been underestmated / underutilized in outsourcing operations. Its excellent destination for outsourcing but need more maturity in training, infrastructure and intl communication management. VisionNet and Ovex are doing good outsourcing business alongwith other US based companies.

Given Mr. Poole's direct experience with companies considering offshore operations, I would be inclined to agree that RISK; is THE factor his prospects are considering. The possibility that a state could collapse is a serious continuity threat to an operation (to say the least). I also agree with Mr.King, that the difference between Pakistan and Mexico in terms of risk is currently similar; however, I would say history, proximity, and law (NAFTA) contribute much weight to the risk factors in favor of Mexico. Outsourcing is all about risk, cost savings are a given.

Good observations here. Outsourcing decision has to do a lot with managing risk. Those who have worked with Pakistan have learned to control the risk and get a great value. Many organizations start off with non-critical tasks and gradually grow their offshore relationship. This is true for Pakistan as well as any other country.

Pakistanis in the US serve as a bridge as well. Silicon valley is full of successful entrepreneurs and professionals who act as intermediary.

OPEN Silicon Valley is one organization - check them out at: http://www.opensiliconvalley.org

Babar
Chief Editor
TelecomPk.Net

We represent offshore companies seeking to market and sell their services in North America. For our clients, we focus on quality, cost and stability among the offshore team. When considering an offshore - we advise companies not to look at location first - but at value and skill... then factor in location. If you have to be on site, there are just as many dangerous places to be. Caution is always the word - but on the flip side. BY supporting the offshore outsourcing teams in Pakistan and others, this can help change (for the better) the geo-politics. http://www.cross-sea-strategy.com

Having some highly skilled worker form pakistan in our Oil and Gas Engineering company, we are amazed by the talent and skills they have demonstarted,
in last managment meeting it was discussed if we could outsouce engineering design work to pakistan based company, and i belive company called SPEC in lahore is invited to come around. They have very strong ENGINEERING Graduate basem which we belive will highly beneficial for us to opertae in middle east.
Security is always concern but as mentioned earlier cities like lahore karachi etc are far from border areas,

There are number of software parks in cities like Islamabad, Lahore and karachi. Where hundreds of software companies are doing great businesses. About stability problem, well there was problem in northern valleys of the country. The fundamentalists can only penetrate into those northern valleys because of lack of education in those areas and minor locals support. The most of the rest of the country is largely educated and the main cities and technologies hubs keep functioning always in any kind of situations. Image of the country is going to become good in sometime as well, as that insurgency problem is solved to most extent. Most of the insurgents are down by the army and Internally displaced persons are now returning to their homes. So overall situation is improving quite fast.

The media portray the picture of just few border area with Afghanistan as the whole picture of Pakistan. It is 7th largest nation in the world. The area of the country is large enough to fit a dozen of countries of Europe. There has been a massive investment in the education sector. There are now probably more universities in Pakistan than Canada. The number of world recognized education institutions like LUMS, GIK, ZABIST, HEJ are increasing and also there is huge number of Pakistani working all over the world proving their talent from universities there. There is no reason not to take the advantage of the low cost and better result since now the old offshore centers like India, China are becoming costly. A lot of US companies are doing indirect offshoring anyways to Pakistan through UAE and Middle East and even through Indian offshoring companies. For the business person the importance is the bottom line and not the media hype. The media is in such a bad shape these days (closing of news paper companies etc) due to recession that it wants to scare you with anything just to sell its ads. But I think with the Obama administration things would be more realistic than the Bush Era.

instability is no doubt there in pakistan, but outsourcing centres like Karachi and Lahore are still undisturbed. as for David's comments on comparing pakistan with afghanistan and iraq, dude u need to step into reality and then judge a country. stop believing in what you see on your media. life in Karachi and Lahore is perfectly normal and IT graduates, linguistic experts, IT vendors etc are in great number. we have an excellent IT infrastructure in the country now, thanx to the previous regime of general perwez musharraf. I myself am running a contact centre and providing back office support to Canadian and American clients. Bell, Rojers, AT&T, IBM , Mobile complete etc are just a few big names that i could remember at the moment. the list is endless.

It's heartening to read so many good impressions about Pakistan. Karachi, the commercial capital of Pakistan, has a large number of universities with excellent undergrad/grad Computer Science/Engineering programs. These include IBA, NED, SZABIST, KIET and others. National University of Modern Languages (NUML) teaches foreign language courses to Ph.D level.

Major IT players like SAP, IBM, Oracle, Microsoft, Intel, etc. are directly present in Pakistan. They all see their businesses growing.

The domestic customer base for IT firms include large banks, pharmaceuticals, petrochemicals, cement, steel, and telecom firms. Many of these firms maintain their own in-house IT departments for core areas and outsource the rest to local IT firms.

This article has done a good service for many Western businesses who may find a new outsourcing opportunity in Pakistan and improve their own competitveness.

Pakistan as outsourcing destination ? is this a joke ? our company had outsourced two mid size project to two different pakistani development companies and the experience was really bad. The work was not delivered in time, there was poor communication and they kept on making excuses.

If you are looking to lose your own clients then feel free to outsource to pakistan, or else stick to local development firms only.

Most of the comments on this post are by pakistanis only, if you are serious about outsourcing, avoid pakistan and stick to Romania, Philippines and India.

The fact that ghana, tunisia and estonia are ahead of pakistan does says alot about the reality here.

There are only 7 countries who are really into outsourcing (upto philipines) and the list ends there. Saying a country is 25th or 30th in the list of outsourcing is like coming 30th in a race of 40 people.

As some one involved in promotion of Higher Education and Scientific Research in Pakistan, I am v.optimistic about Pakistan's furture due to its hard working, concientious, young population.The present instability that this country is experiencing will not last long.

In Pakistan, the big cities like Lahore, Islamabad & Karachi are really safe places for outsourcing. They have great IT infrastructure and work force. Now these cities are covered with wireless high speed Internet coverage(USB) and the companies have power backups as well in form of Generators & UPS.

Outsourcing to Pakistan is not only the cheaper but the main point is the quality. I myself is an enterpernur and we are providing web services to US & UK based companies. We are working with some of the companies have switched outsourcing from India to Pakistan due to quality and rates issues.

@Rachael King
NY Times is one big name that comes to my mind thinking about US companies outsourcing in Pakistan.

"The infrastructure is lot better than what you will observe in most cities of India, which is currently ranked at top."

NOTHING COMPARES AN IIT

We have a branch in Lahore, Pakistan that is mainly IT related. It's been 3 great years so far. I couldn't agree more on "image" side, but 80% of the Pakistan is all peaceful and cities like Lahore, Karachi, Islamabad, Faisalabad are booming. I have travelled there many time myself and people are nice and very helpful.

Also, one thing I noticed is that English language skill is wayyyyyy better than many countries like China, Malaysia, Indonesia, sometimes even India. Better accent :)

nothing much to say, but it is good to hear some positive news about Pakistan

I am a big fan of Pakistan industry. It has lots of brilliant people working there. We have worked with 2-3 mid-size companies and the cost/quality they have been providing is fabulous. I wonder why they ranked it at 20 , should be in Top 10.

According to me, the main purpose of outsourcing is to reduce cost and get almost the same quality, that they would have had developing on-shore. The Quality factor is where Pakistan stands way much high than India (ranked 1). Also, the infrastructure cost is low, the talent pool is huge, people are very humble and co-operative.

Security is bit shaky but I don't think it should affect the industry because, in my 6-7 years relationship, I haven't heard of the team taking off due to security concerns.

With tremendous improvement in communication technologies like telecommunication and internet, Pakistan offers virtual globalization of highly skilled human capital to the world.

There are always other options to outsource to other countries like China, Russia Philippine and some of the Eastern European countries e.g. Romania, Ukraine and Poland but these choices are marked up with poor English skills, lack of exposure to Western business culture, shaky foreign relations and immaturity of processes all pose risks.

No other economy can match Pakistan’s labor pool of educated English-speaking workers. No other economy can match Pakistan’s scalability, reliability and low-cost environment.

The rapid growth of the sector is largely due to foreign IT firms setting up operations in Pakistan in a bid to reduce costs and raise profits.

For further information, please visit : http://seo-consultant-specialist.com/wblog/?paged=2

I am an expat from the UK and owner of www.titlewebsolutions.com and www.titledevelopments.com. We have been successfully running our offshore development office in Lahore for over 10 years. Although the current instability does get to us sometimes but I believe its temporary and the ready availability of skilled resources, infrastructure and huge cost savings compensate for that. In my opinion Pakistan is still the best choice for outsourcing for our type of business and we don't plan to move elsewhere for at least a few years.

Jon

It is not too difficult to see a lot of comments are from Pakistani's. I agree with the gentlemen who says, its like coming 30th in a race of 40 people. Their education system is far behind India. Their internal and extrnal conflicts, make them a really unsafe destination. The government is totally currupt, half the people are educated in Madarsa's and are taught that all non-muslims are evil.

Whatever little Pakistan has achived today, is because of funding from US government over the years. If that support is pulled off, they will crumble.

I like to wish good luck to companies who want to get work done in Pakistan. Sure you will get cheap people there, but always remember: "if you pay peanuts, you get monkeys".

http://www.barrypopik.com/index.php/new_york_city/entry/if_you_pay_peanuts_you_get_monkeys/

Unnecessarily bashing a country will not change the reality Deepak. It doesn't serve any purpose other than speaking volumes about your character flaws and insecurities.

Alan
Project Director
http://www.titlewebsolutions.com

Ruling elites in Pakistan are publicly wringing their hands about the security situation in the NW Territories because for the first time in years they can't just pocket the loot, now they have to take care of 2M internally displaced refugees. They learned that public terror alarm grifting technique from Zarkari, it's how you get another $5B in baaksheesh during the next round of "Emergency Funding for Obamastan and other undisclosed national security purposes" Defense carnival. We're using Pakistani IT's right now, no problems other than some seasonal vacations.

Let me tell you two things friends.
1. Pakistan is a great country.
2. Don't listen to your media.Your governments Political motives are behind it to destabilize Pakistan's image. It is not like that she is a war torn country and bombs and grenades are falling and exploding . Almost every country has terrorist activities and crime is every where. So why only Pakistan is to be targeted?

MR. Mitchell
We know you are the Pakistani with the western name. You do not necessarily have to talk bad about India when projecting ( rather begging) IT outsouricng for Pakistan. Indian outsourcing has come long way .. we have invested lots of things which you guys cannot imagine.. its not about just good infrastructure or so called natural engilsh accents but its more about people .. unless people like Nandan Nlkeni or Azim Premji or Ashok Sotta and many more in Pakistan you are no where.. today India is not dependent on Captive centers but our home grown compnaies like Infy, Wipro are taking head on with Global giants .. so do not talk nonsense when you don't know the things .. just calling somebody eles bad does not project you good..

The fact that certain areas in Pakistan are facing security issues does not at all imply firstly, the duplication of same situation else where and secondly, scarcity of skilled IT professionals. Pakistan is producing various new IT institutes every year to meet the needs of global outsourcing requirements and hence is coming out as a noticeable player in the international market.

@Deepak
Can you please provide some credible sources (of course other than internet) for the 'logical' conclusion that you have drawn regarding half the population getting educated in Madrasas and learning that non-muslims are evil? If not, then please avoid making biased judgments based on emotions and not real facts.

Without getting into debate, this is just to let the business comunity know that Pakistan offers tremendous opportunities of investment in housing and power generation sector.
This is good to know that Pakistan is becoming a good international market. In my view investing in Pakistan can prove more prifitable than doing it in India (without prejudice) becasue Pakistan has got a location that is unique, exports can be made from Pakistan to Afghanistan, to Iran, to middle East, to central asia, to china and to europe even through sea and land route. On the other hand...Pakistan is route to India, Bengladesh, and East Asian countries.

In my view the companies which invest in Pakistan will get more advantage than doing this in any other South asian country.

@sajjad well said

Outsourcing of high-tech work to Pakistan could benefit Western companies during the current economic crisis. Pakistan has people with strong computing and engineering skill sets. The talent base covers ERP software implementation like SAP and Oracle.

Besides software implementation, there are strong skills available in software development using Java, C++, VB, even COBOL and RPG. In databases, there are people certified in Oracle and SQL Server, with DB2 expertise on IBM i Series (AS/400). There are good software maintenance skills available.

Perhaps the areas for improvement are in software project management and documentation. Western companies interested in outsourcing work to Pakistan should get specific commitments in these two areas.

The upside is that there are no software fraud stories like Satyam.

And the downside is there are no companies which are even 10% of the Satyam.

I've strong believe that PAKISTAN has a lot of skillful and hardworking people who can still help PAKISTAN to become on TOP of WORLD. Especially from the main of Emgineering , IT, Civil Engineering and Bio Techs.Although, now a days due to some terrorism there is a shaky conditions but WE WILL definately overcome on these issues.

There are seriously only few countries worthy of being in rank.
Being Ranked as 20 is like being first 10 in the class from bottom .

As a Manager i would seriously not consider pakistan option.cost of outsourcing to pakistan and india is same.

Talent pool is pretty low in pakistan.
Bpo outsourcing can't go without some of development work in software.
i would prefer a bpo job to go to a company which has bpo,development center.

Pakistan is highly unstable and it's survival is dependent on american needs.

It has hardly any world class colleges like Chinese and indian one's .

Why we are blaming to each others? In fact security issues are common in India Pakistan today. On one side if we see military operation against militants in Pakistan then we can also see military operation by Indian army in Kashmir to against freedom of Kashmirs. Where they kill thousands of innocent people over years.
So, leave this all situation. IT is very rapidly growing field in both India and Pakistan. No doubt in India it is faster than Pakistan but Pakistanis are also ready to move with world.
As a Pakistani and as a IT professional i hope we will succeeded to insure the world that Pakistan is great place for IT investment. We are trying to finifh the dark side that has been created by our enemies who are not happy to our success. We will defeat them as we are doing.
My message to whole world:
We Love the world, We want friendship to all countries. We love to work in US, UK, China and all other European and Middle East countries.
Thanks alot !