NATIONAL SURVEY
Bulgaria as an outsourcing centre.....
Bulgaria IT will remain the backbone of Bulgaria’s outsourc- ing services throughout 2010, where up to 20% growth is expected. Even more rapid growth is expected in BPO – up to 25% for CY 2010. Bulgarian companies will continue to proactively expand their portfolio of provided outsourcing services and supported languages. The financial attractive- ness and availability of a skilled workforce will lead to a further rapid development & growth of the other four major outsourcing cities in Bulgaria, as well as capital Sofia.
viders. In conclusion, the rebound of the software and IT services industry is still dependent on public sectors projects but also on possible foreign invest- ments in production and services in Romania, he says. In October 2009, Cisco published the results of a survey called
“Broadband Quality Study” which was looking not only at broadband pen- etration, but also at broadband quality. The study showed many interesting aspects of the leapfrog-effect Zoran Radumilo was talking about: for example the study found that Lithuania, Bulgaria and Latvia come just behind Sweden in quality boosted by recent city-based fibre rollouts and cable improvements - however low broadband penetration means these countries have yet to break into the broadband leaders’ category. Also, Romania showed some great improvements regarding broadband quality. Serbia Broadband has been quite active in recent months both in Serbia and Slovenia. And education will be a very important part of this future development.
Judit Sinko at Cisco says that there is a plan to increase the number of Cisco Academies, and what they offer: “So the academies are not just training students in networking skills, but the content has been broadened to wire- less unified communications, security and IT essentials. Students that join the programme actually have wider choice of content. This is important and the importance of vocational education is becoming more recognised at the national government level. The EC-promoted all-EU eSkills event in March was embraced broadly in the countries with IT fitness tests organised in most south
east Europe countries. “The internet generation is entering the workplace all across the region
and they expect a rich set of communication and collaboration tools to do their work efficiently. This is creating an interesting momentum for the coming times,” she concludes. And with the apparently weaker areas such as Kosovo even setting up
twelve new academies, it is apparent that the demand and hunger for IT train- ing will create a strong position in future years.
OUR ANALYSIS
This past decade saw a transformation in South East Europe’s IT. Helped by rising GDP in each country averaging some 6%, and some major investment in infrastructure by the EU and other sources, the countries were building nicely until the economic downturn stopped everything. But having picked themselves up, and with investment restarting, they are proving resilient and with relatively young but low paid populations, IT is seen as a force for good, both personally, and by governments. The most far-sighted IT vendors have been present and growing in the region for years. These coun- tries, particularly Romania with its strong technical and language skills, will be seen to represent a resource for the rest of Europe in years to come. Some large companies have already seen this and are locating some HQ functions there - all HP European accounts go through Romania. Technical education investment will be the key indicator of growth in future years.
30 APR 2010
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