Author: Ivan Dzhuha

3 million deaths worldwide, the year of permanent lockdowns, the collapse of the tourism and airline industries ‒ COVID-19 has a massive impact on the global economy and our everyday lives. Bad news aside, the pandemic has boosted a number of sectors and business services ‒ from tools for remote work to the development of VR. 

Tools and platforms for communication 

A very sudden transition to remote work with the introduction of strict quarantine measures in most countries meant everyone had to adapt quickly and set up new processes within companies.

The number of users of the Microsoft Teams service increased by 44 million; Zoom became massively popular practically overnight ‒ the company’s revenue in the first quarter of 2020 increased by 169%, and in the fourth quarter ‒ by 369%. The video communication platform ended the year 2020 with $670 million in revenue. In comparison, the company’s revenue at the end of 2019 was only $22 million. According to the forecasts, the online communications market will continue to grow in the upcoming years.

E-learning platforms

Most university students, as well as school students, have been forced to study online because of the quarantine. Schools and universities had to look for a way out of the situation and adapt quickly to the big change. The pandemic equated online learning with, for example, university classes that have been also transferred online.

Coursera, one of the best-known online learning resources, saw a 60% increase in students in 2020. The Linkedin Learning platform also saw rapid growth in March 2020. The number of users of the platform increased by 46% compared to February 2020.

AR/VR

Not only education and work went online, but also shopping, sports, entertainment, and even socialization. Augmented and virtual reality technologies can especially benefit during this time due to the bigger number of people allowed in the virtual world. AR/VR aims to make this world more interactive and interesting.
The Louvre, the world’s most visited museum, known for crowds of visitors, can now be visited virtually within its VR exhibition. The Vatican offers a virtual tour of the Sistine Chapel, and the American Yosemite National Park ‒ virtual tours of the picturesque places.

When approached right, outsourcing software development can save you a great deal of money, time, as well as help you open up new business opportunities and expand the existing pool of experts. But, if the proper research hasn’t been done, there might be some challenges along the way. Earlier we focused on things to pay attention to when choosing a tech vendor. Today, we want to concentrate on the best countries to outsource software development.

India

India is one of the largest English-speaking countries in the world, which makes it an attractive destination for clients from the USA and the UK. While the overall literacy in the country is pretty low, the Indian education system pays a lot of attention to mathematics, producing over 2 million STEM graduates every year. According to Statista, in 2018, IT service exports in India amounted to $74 billion. India is also one of the fastest-growing economies in the world, which is no wonder why global tech giants such as Microsoft and Google choose to build their new R&D centers in vibrant Indian tech hubs, such as Bangalore.

Ukraine

With a talent pool of over 200,000 tech professionals and 36,000 tech graduates annually, Ukraine is one of the most promising destinations for software outsourcing. More than 110 global tech companies, including Google, Samsung, Snap, etc., have chosen Ukraine to open their R&D offices. In 2018, Ukrainian IT services export reached $4.5 billion and is expected to continue to grow at 20% annually. According to SkillValue 2019 report, Ukrainian software developers are among the top 5 in the world. 85% of Ukrainian developers speak intermediate or higher levels of English. Ukraine works in the GMT+3 timezone, which overlaps with both the UK and the US working times.

China

HackerRank rates Chinese developers the first in the world, with an overall score of 100. China has over 4.7 million STEM graduates annually, and the expected growth rate of its tech industry is 15% annually over the next 5 years. 13 Chinese software vendors are among the world’s top 30 fastest growing software companies. Among obvious drawbacks of working with a tech vendor from China, are the country’s low English skills ‒ only 10 million Chinese nationals speak English.

Poland

With a population of roughly 38 million people, Poland is globally known for its highly skilled and inexpensive tech talent. Poland has become a regional leader in outsourcing IT services and an attractive place for business software development. It has 18 technology universities and more than 15,000 new tech specialists annually. Computer Science, Geoinformatics, ICT, and Applied Computer Science were the most popular fields of study in 2016 and 2017. With over 279,800 specialized tech employees, Poland’s IT services market equaled $4,62 billion in 2018. According to HackerRank, Polish developers are the third best in the world.

Philippines
English is the second official language in the Phillippines ‒ over 90 million of its population speak English. According to Tholons Releases 2018 Services Globalization Index, the country’s capital, Manila is the world’s second best city for outsourcing. The Philippines is home to over 190,000 tech professionals with forecasts that by 2022, this number will reach 210,000. Major global companies that operate within the Phillippines include IBM, HP, Accenture, and others. Cost competitiveness is one of the key advantages of outsourcing to the Philippines.

The year 2020 had seen mass ongoing protests against Lukashenko’s regime in Belarus, cruelty of national police, and repression of human freedoms which made numerous Belarusian tech companies relocate their employees ​​abroad, including neighboring countries including Poland, Lithuania, and Ukraine. 

The Ukrainian authorities took measures to help Belarusian tech specialists, expanding the quotas for highly qualified foreign tech specialists coming to Ukraine. This year, five thousand employees can take advantage of this opportunity. The government has also liberalized the requirements for such specialists. In particular, the minimum work experience was reduced to three years, and the minimum income for the previous year to $24k.

In early September, Ukraine’s Ministry of Digital Transformation jointly with the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the Ministry of Economy launched an information portal with 24/7 support for Belarusian citizens interested in relocating to Ukraine. The website provides a step-by-step guide on relocation and employment opportunities, as well as a call center phone number in case you need additional assistance. The web portal cooperates with Ukrainian companies and the tech community to help Belarusian tech professionals find employment in Ukraine and officially obtain a residence permit.

As of September, about 1,200 Belarusian tech specialists have relocated to Ukraine since the beginning of Belarus’s protests. Deputy Minister for Digital Transformation of Ukraine Oleksandr Borniakov said, “We have a hotline, and have estimated that about a thousand tech professionals crossed the border, while in August there were about two hundred. The flow has been growing since the situation is not calming down”.
Another simplification for Belarusian tech specialists was the decree № 420/2020 signed by the President of Ukraine on October 4, which aims to loosen bureaucratic barriers and the requirements for Belarusian entrepreneurs and tech professionals willing to relocate to Ukraine. In particular, the period of stay for Belarusian citizens (entrepreneurs, tech specialists) in Ukraine will be extended from 90 to 180 days per year. The waiting time to obtain temporary residence permits and work permits for tech specialists, entrepreneurs, and their families was reduced to 5 days. Besides, the decree simplifies the registration procedure of individual entrepreneurs. Ukraine also intends to create a virtual free economic zone for tech companies with a special tax, financial, and legal regime in 2021.

The number of vacancies in the global tech market doesn’t correspond to the existing number of tech talents. Most countries both in the EU and North America report a shortage of tech professionals. According to the latest report of the European Commission Analysis of Shortage and Surplus Occupations 2020, 13 EU member states indicated the lack of tech talents. Maybe one should look for Ukrainian software developers? Let’s find out why.

Highly qualified software developers

Over the last year, according to DOU.ua, the number of tech specialists in Ukraine has increased by 16%, or almost 30,000 people (in 2020 there were 183,437 tech specialists). Today, the Ukrainian tech industry employs 212,547 tech specialists. There is a considerable demand for tech industry experts in Ukraine. Compared to 2020, the number of tech vacancies increased by 9%, reaching 5,000 vacancies per month on the popular tech media resource DOU.ua.

Despite the fact that  2021 has become a difficult year for companies around the world due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the data of the ACC 2021 survey show that the tech industry in Ukraine is growing rapidly. 60% of companies anticipate an increase in revenue in 2021, 31% plan to expand the number of employees, and 39% plan to increase investment.

As of 2020, Ukraine ranked 4th among all European countries in terms of technical skills according to the Global Skill Index 2020 report by Coursera. The report shows that the general level of qualification of Ukrainians in the tech sphere is 95% with the highest possible rate of 100%.

According to LinkedIn Research conducted by Daxx, there are 9,000 PHP developers in Ukraine, compared to just 7,000  in the USA. 8000 Ukrainians specialize in  Java, the same number in JavaScript, 3000 are Python developers, 1000 ‒ Ruby on Rails.

Global recognition of the Ukrainian tech industry 

Every year a number of surveys identify tech leaders around the world. For example, in 2021 11 Ukrainian software development companies have been included in the influential Global Outsourcing 100, an annual ranking of the industry’s leading companies. Among the Ukrainian companies included in the list are Eleks, Ciklum, Infopulse, Innovecs, Intellias, Intetics, Miratech, N-iX, NIX Solutions, Program-Ace, and Sigma Software. Being included in the Global Outsourcing 100 by IAOP means global recognition by the world’s top experts.

One should also pay attention to the Global Innovation Index (GII), which assesses the innovation performance of countries. In 2020, 131 countries were included in the ranking, with Ukraine in 45th place. GII ranking assesses several indicators in a  country, based on the study of the level of education, institutions, infrastructure, and business development.

Developed tech ecosystem

The active development of the Ukrainian tech industry began about 25 years ago, between two generations. As of 2020, according to the Idapgroup survey, there were 11,932 tech companies and more than 100 R&D centers in Ukraine according to UAPost.

Some of the most famous tech companies in the world were founded in Ukraine. For example, the successful startup Grammarly, an online service that uses AI to help you write in English without errors. Grammarly is used daily by 30,000,000 people, and the company’s annual revenue is $73.2 million, according to Growjo. Another startup is People.ai, a platform that helps businesses maximize profits from each potential customer. The company’s annual revenue amounts to more than $20 million. One more Ukrainian company that has successfully conquered the international market is Ajax Systems. The company was founded in 2011 and in 2018 their security system became the most awarded security system in Europe.

The world’s leading companies have opened more than 110 R&D centers in Ukraine. In 2020, Google opened its development center in Kyiv (one of three in Eastern Europe). Snap also has an R&D center in Ukraine and actively involves Ukrainian software developers in the company’s projects. Among other global companies with R&D centers in Ukraine are Amazon, Boeing, Oracle, Microsoft, Samsung, Huawei, NetCracker, and Wargaming.The number of tech talents is constantly growing due to quality education. Ukraine ranks fourth in the World Bank Enrollment Index in terms of higher education and 38th out of 50 in the National Higher Education Systems ranking. Every year, according to the Ministry of Infrastructure of Ukraine, 130,000 tech specialists graduate from the country’s universities, this number is a few times bigger than in other European countries. Stem education is becoming more and more popular in Ukraine with the development of the tech industry, accordingly, the largest share of Stem and tech graduates in Europe is concentrated here ‒ 9.8%.