Offshoring not on radar of majority of American firms

Stan Beer
Thursday, 02 June 2005 09:55

IT Industry - Development

More than half of a sizeable sample of North American firms, both large and small, have indicated that they have no plans to offshore their IT functions.

A survey from Forrester Research of 113 North American enterprises, of which 75% had greater than 1000 employees, showed that 46% have no intention of using offshore IT service providers in the next 12 months. A further 10% of enterprises said that were not using offshorers but were tracking developments, while another 7% had no idea of what they would do about offshoring.

Of the remaining 37% of enterprises who have had contact with offshore service providers, 14% said they use offshorers whenever possible, 14% said they had made a commitment to offshoring but were still ramping up its use, and 9% said they pilot projects in place but not yet made a commitment to offshoring.

Of the companies that are currently engaged in offshoring, one third report that it is too early to say whether they saving money, according to the Forrester survey.