Outsourcing: Interview with Roop Singh, VP and Head for North America, Europe and JAPAC at Wipro Consulting Services (Part 2)

Sramana Mitra: Can you talk about specific examples where you have made use of near shoring – especially in-country – resourcing for corporations? What locations have you chosen, for what reasons, and what drove those choices? What are cost structure dynamics, etc.?

Roop Singh: Let’s take the example of North America. In North America, given the tightening immigration policies and the fact that unemployment and the economic crisis hit, we took a proactive view and set up our development center in Atlanta. >>>

Outsourcing: Interview with Roop Singh, VP and Head for North America, Europe and JAPAC at Wipro Consulting Services (Part 1)

Roop Sing is the vice president and head for North America, Europe, and JAPAC at Wipro Consulting Services. Roop brings more than 24 years of financial experience to the company. Prior to Wipro he was CEO of SSI Technology. He graduated from Henley, obtaining an MBA in international business. In this interview Roop talks about outsourcing strategies focused in different areas of the world, including the U.S., Latin America, Europe, and Asia, specially focusing on insourcing vs. outsourcing strategies.

Sramana Mitra: Roop, let’s set some context about what part of Wipro you work in and your background, so the audience knows whom they are meeting today.

Roop Singh: I am Roop Singh and I run Wipro’s Consulting Services. The Wipro Consulting Organization operates primarily out of North America, Europe, Asia Pacific, and India. >>>

Outsourcing: Interview with Harley Lippman, CEO of Genesis10 (Part 7)

Sramana Mitra: I find that attrition is one of the biggest problems in the industry because any learning or domain expertise that you develop in the person walks out the door once that person walks out the door.

Harley Lippman: When that happens, there are unintended consequences. Someone leaves, for example. Now you have to have a meeting on the side if you are going to replace that person. Just having that meeting costs time and money. Let’s assume you are going to replace that person, which is typically the situation, you now hire another person. That person may not work out. So, it compounds the impact on the project because now you set back even further. Let’s be optimistic and say the person does work out. But, as you say, the learning curve might make that person take six months to become productive. >>>

Outsourcing: Interview with Harley Lippman, CEO of Genesis10 (Part 6)

Sramana Mitra: What I am trying to do is capture the trends. I think the trend is that there is work coming back to the U.S. That is a real trend, and one that I forecast five years ago. If you are interested, you should read the article in Forbes called “The Coming Death of Indian Outsourcing.” Of course that was a deliberately provocative article, and it rattled the entire Indian industry. All the CEOs were calling me, but the truth is that there was wage inflation going on and there were several other factors like time zone, for example, becoming issues. It was real. The voice call center industry, for example, has shifted away from India. Part of it has come back to the U.S. and part of it has gone to the Philippines. >>>

Outsourcing: Interview with Harley Lippman, CEO of Genesis10 (Part 5)

Sramana Mitra: The only question mark would be the skill set, whether the skill set is still contemporary or not.

Harley Lippman: That is true. It all depends on how long they have been out of work, what skill sets they have, etc. If you are dealing with legacy systems and there is an increasing shortage of people who know COBOL or CICS, clearly you will find more people than you may realize. >>>

Outsourcing: Interview with Harley Lippman, CEO of Genesis10 (Part 4)

Sramana Mitra: You discussed different regions: Michigan, Cleveland, Georgia and Kansas City. What are each of them individually? Are those competitive landscapes?

Harley Lippman: In certain cities there is more talent and certain skill sets than in others. .Net or Java people – certain places have a greater preponderance of those people. In Kansas City, for example, you may have more project managers. First of all, you want to diversify locations – this is a mitigation of risk. Second, you have greater access to a different or additional talent pool. >>>

Outsourcing: Interview with Harley Lippman, CEO of Genesis10 (Part 3)

Sramana Mitra: And what scale operations are these?

Harley Lippman: It will vary at the time of the work. It could be anywhere from a few hundred to about 1,000 people.

SM: So you are one of the companies doing this. How big is the onshore outsourcing market for IT services right now? >>>

Outsourcing: Interview with Harley Lippman, CEO of Genesis10 (Part 2)

Sramana Mitra: The trend of what has become to be known as “near shoring” is definitely something we have been hearing about for a while now – three or four years at least. I imagine the trend has matured this year, and I am looking forward to discussing that with you. We have seen that a lot of the near shoring trend in U.S. companies outsourcing to Latin America, Central America, and some others. One of our interviewees called it “Third World United States.” Then we have seen Europe outsourcing to Eastern Europe, Africa, etc. So, we have seen this near shoring trend in various interviews. You are specifically working on within the U.S., is that correct? >>>