If you are looking for an attractive destination for offshore software development, nothing can beat Eastern Europe. This country has rapidly grown in this domain. A few years ago, software companies in the UK, the USA and Western Europe preferred the Philippines and India as their outsourcing destinations because the only benefit was low cost. However, the service quality was below standard. In case of Eastern Europe procurement, the perks are high-quality services, affordable price, a pool of talents, good communication and convenient time zones.

What Are The Pros Of Choosing Eastern Europe?

Here are the key advantages:

• Superior Skills at a Budget Price- Software engineers in Eastern Europe quote a price lower than the professionals in the US. Though they charge more than the Philippines and India, it does not impact their quality of work.
• Time Zone- You can have a few extended hours between n Ukraine’s offshore team and the US head office. Therefore work can be done within 24 hours.
• A Pool of Talent- Unlike others, white-collared individuals from Eastern Europe are more passionate about IT and are moving forward to getting a degree in it. The domain is booming and more and more young people want to keep up with the current trends of technology in the globe.
• Location and Culture- If you take Ukraine as an example, it has international airports and takes around 8 hours to reach the US east coast. Hence, managing projects becomes easier because you can fly down and communicate with the team face-to-face. This is why Eastern Europe sourcing is rising and is in demand.
• Laws and Regulation- In Ukraine, you will find a law about Intellectual Protection that safeguards the computer programs and databases’ copyright. In short, no codes can be shared with third parties.

Which Problems You Can Face?

• Confused Taxation- Do you know that the taxation system of the Eastern European countries can confuse oversea clients? Before heading into a business, you need to understand the business entity and how to issue the payment. Suppose, if you are dealing with Ukraine, you will see the lowest tax rates in Europe.
• Developers Leave the Project- Eastern Europe has a highly competitive environment in IT. There are times that local agencies lose their developers and run in losses.
• Poor Communication- In many cases, it has been seen that when you want to collaborate with a software development agency, you get the chance to talk to the project manager. You fail to communicate with the team directly.
• No Privacy of Sensitive Information- If contracts are signed in a rush with no NDA, you can face this trouble. Some developers may use codes in their portfolio, violating the rules.
• No Flexibility- Sometimes, it is seen that project manager or team leaders often leave the projects in between. This becomes impossible to predict and adding more people to the team takes time.

Which Country Should You Choose in Europe?

The conditions for Eastern Europe procurement vary from one country to another.

Poland

Poland has the fastest growing economy in the EU and has reached economic stability in no time. This steady growth has also encouraged the boom of the IT sector in this country. Some of the key facts of Poland are:

• The country has a wide pool of talent. It has approximately 1, 40,000 developers working in more than 450 companies.
• Surprisingly, the skills of the software engineers are ranked 3rd and 4th by HackerRank and TopCoder respectively.
• The hourly rate of Polish software developers starts from 50 USD.
• The technology universities in Poland have more than 15,000 graduates.

Ukraine

Ukraine has already shown promising results in terms of offshore software development and technological innovation. Some startups which are now worldwide recognised like, Petcube and Grammarly were built and established in this land. Some interesting facts about this country are written below.

• As per the Global Sourcing Association, Ukraine was declared as the ‘Outsourcing Destination of the Year’ in 2017.
• The software developers’ skills are ranked 6th and 11th by TopCoder and HackerRank respectively.
• Ukraine is also ranked as the best country with talented software engineers in the security domain by HackerRank.
• This country too has a wide pool of talents where you will find nearly 116,000 developers employed in more than 1000 tech companies.
• The software developers charge around 37 USD per hour on average.

Romania

Now, Romania has achieved the top 5 positions among the European Union countries because of its speeding economy. Mostly, the companies focus on the fintech industry because the bank commissions occupy a huge share in the region. Hence, the startups focussing on fintech is relatively a cheaper option. Though Romania is an apt place for fintech revolution, it has other facts are well, like:

• In Romania, you will find more than 1 lakh software engineers.
• The skills of the developers in this country are ranked 16th and 20th by TopCoder and HackerRank respectively.
• The Romanian developers are specialised in PHP and Java. These are the core technologies here.
• Romania’s tech industry grew up to $4.2 billion and produced 5% of the GDP in the year 2017.
• The final word- Should you invest in Eastern Europe?

Eastern Europe is in the process of becoming an attractive location for offshore software development countries. For Eastern Europe sourcing, countries, such as Romania, Poland and Ukraine are favoured most because these outsourcing destinations come with benefits- advanced skills, a huge talent pool, feasible time zones and clear communication.

To not to engage in any risks, you need to select an outsourcing vendor carefully and ensure complete honesty and transparency in each stage. This is especially required whilst signing an agreement and during the transaction between two businesses. Though you may find some disadvantages and limitations whilst outsourcing in Eastern Europe, you will save a lot of cost on infrastructure and technology in the long run.