Now that 2022 is gone, we can say that it was another challenging year for the world economy, startups, and big companies. The Covid-19 pandemic, a war, and an energy crisis – all these events have affected the global economy.
But how are things changing for startups and big enterprises? In the first months of 2022, investors in North America put $82.8 billion into early-stage startups, which is down 11% from the previous quarter, but it was still the fourth-highest quarterly total in history.
Thus, in this period of recession, it'll take more work to get investments, so founders should be more mindful of their expenses and think of the profit first.
Hiring an offshore development team is an excellent possibility for founders not to give up hope in 2023 and to continue developing their software products even during these economic changes. In this article, we'll share some tips on how to hire offshore development teams, where to find the best of them, and keep your business afloat during a recession.
What is Offshore Development?
Offshore development, or 'offshoring' – the process of engaging an external vendor in a different country to build software. The term' offshore' is used to highlight a substantial distance (often time-zone difference) between the client and the location of the offshore developers.
Growing startups and established businesses benefit from hiring an offshore development team, including cost reduction, shorter time to market, and flexibility. Offshore development team services aren't limited to building an app from scratch. Developers may provide specific services such as back-end, front-end development, UI/UX design, QA, or product management.
Let's name the key reasons to give you a better picture of how exactly your business can benefit from hiring an offshore development team.
Why Hire an Offshore Development Team?
The startup landscape has changed over the past decades. There’s a decreasing window for startups to get their ideas to the market and a growing number of competitors. Co-founders are hard-pressed to strike a delicate balance between quality, cost, and promptness. This proves to be a tough order for startups in high-cost developed nations and makes offshoring an attractive option.
The Benefits of Hiring Offshore Development Team
There are various strong motivations for a startup to hire from offshore.
Access to a vast talent pool
Countries like the US, Canada, and the UK face a prolonged spell of talent drought. Finding the right developers for the job seems to be a tall order even for the best recruiters. By shifting your attention to offshore developers, you tap into a vast pool of professional developers. Chances are, you’ll find developers with matching skill sets from an offshore IT company.
Reduce recruitment time
The typical hiring process takes you through a thorough review of dozens of applications, rounds of interviews before confirming a hire. This doesn’t include the onboarding and any necessary training required by a new employee. Hiring offshore developers takes these hiring routines out of your hand and spares your precious time on things that matter to a startup.
Flexibility and scalability
Startups thrive when they maintain a lean operational structure, and that’s what offshoring offers. With offshoring, you work with offshore developers according to your project needs. There’s no long-term commitment that might burden your startup, particularly in earlier stages. You’ll also have the flexibility to scale up or down the developer team as your startup grows.
Cost-effective development
One of the greatest obstacles to hiring local developers is the high salary they command. For example, a US developer takes home an average salary of $107,510 annually. Most startups operate on a tight budget and seek offshore developers to keep development costs low.
The lower cost of living in popular offshoring destinations means that startups pay a fraction of what it costs to build an app in developed countries.
Work with proven IT developers
Building an app is a complicated process and involves various risks. Even if you’ve hired a technically-sound developer, a misalignment between the app and business goals can still lead to failure. By hiring offshore, you get to connect with developers who have worked on similar projects. They’ll navigate around common pitfalls and strengthen your chance for success.
Where to Find Offshore Development Team
There’s no doubt that offshoring is exceptionally beneficial for startups, but where do you find the right offshore development team? This won’t be a problem if you know where to start looking.
Digital publications
Offshore developers aren’t only good at building apps; they are more than generous to share app development tips. When you’re brainstorming for IT know-hows for your startup, you might stumble on blog articles written by offshore developers. They might publish these blogs on their websites or popular platforms like LinkedIn or Medium.
There’s much to gain from reading through such publications. Not only you’ll be aware of their technical expertise, but you’ll also be assured of various factors that might promote collaboration with the remote IT team. For example, you can anticipate language proficiency by judging how ideas are conveyed in the article.
Review platforms
You ought to perform due diligence before hiring any offshore development team. One of the best ways to do so is to find out how they fare in the eyes of their past clients. Instead of reaching out to the clients, check out review platforms like Clutch, Wadline, and GoodFirm.
These websites have a rating system and testimonials from clients who have engaged in the services of top remote software offshoring companies. Information like hourly rates and service types help you match the right offshore developers with your startup’s requirements.
Freelance websites
Engaging a full-fledged development team is not your only option for offshoring. Sometimes, startups may prefer to work with freelance developers. In such cases, you’ll want to visit freelancing portals like Upwork, Guru, and Toptal. While there is an abundance of freelance developers worldwide, you’ll need to be aware of the challenges of managing and coordinating tasks with freelancers instead of working with a team.
Location to Find Offshore Development Team
The increasing demand for IT outsourcing has seen the emergence of South America, Asia, and Eastern Europe as top offshoring destinations.
Eastern Europe
Eastern European countries like Ukraine, Poland, Belarus, and Romania have stamped their spots in the IT outsourcing industry. The region hits the sweet spots of cost-effectiveness, talent, cultural and language similarity, and a manageable time zone. While Eastern European countries may not rival Asian developers in price, they compensate with consistency, quality, communication, and timeliness.
Uptech team is mainly located in Eastern Europe countries. However, we have members in Asia and Western Europe. So we can gather the team that suits your time zone perfectly.
South America
Given the proximity to US startups, it isn’t surprising for South American countries to emerge as an offshoring powerhouse. Countries like Brazil, Argentina, Chile, Colombia, and Mexico are driving the IT outsourcing industry in the region. These countries offer a combined workforce of more than 500,000 IT experts in various disciplines in 2020, and the number is expected to grow in the near future.
Brazil and Argentina are top picks for their vast talent pool and low hourly rates. Developers in these countries are proficient in English, and the IT industry enjoys strong support from the respective governments.
Asia
Asia has long been a well-known outsourcing spot for app development. The region boasts at least 4 million IT professionals eager to take on any type of project. It’s an open secret that cost is the primary motivating factor for outsourcing to Asian countries. For example, an app developer in India commands an average salary of $20,000 per year, a fraction of their US-based counterparts.
Developers in India, China, and Vietnam have what it takes to build a proper-functional app, but you’ll need to be wary of the language and cultural differences.
How to Hire an Offshore Development Team
You’ll be spoiled for options when it comes to app development outsourcing. And choosing the right offshore team is instrumental to your startup’s success. The question is, how do you determine which developers are a good fit and which are not?
Here’s a step-by-step guide to choosing the offshore development team.
Step 1 - Identify your startup’s requirements
This includes various considerations, including the type of project, country, and collaboration model. For example, you’ll need a developer proficient in Node.js for backend development, but you’ll need a team of multidisciplinary experts to build a comprehensive cloud solution.
Then, you’ll need to decide if you prefer working with Eastern European developers, as they share a similar culture with Western countries. Or strike a collaboration with Latin American offshore companies?
Also, take time to consider the best collaboration model for your startup. Do you benefit from a fixed-price arrangement, or do you prefer being charged by time and material?
Step 2 - Ask for recommendations
Offshoring is an established hiring method, and many startups are familiar with it. If your business acquaintance has gotten great results from an offshore IT company, you might want to be referred to.
Step 3 - Check review platforms
Don’t believe everything you read on the offshore IT company’s website. Instead, compare their marketing pitch with real testimonials. This means checking out independent review platforms like Clutch.
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Step 4 - Prepare a shortlist
By now, you’ll have a better idea of which offshore IT companies might be a good fit for your startup. List them down along with their contacts.
Step 5 - Conduct first interview
Reach out to the offshore IT developers and arrange for an interview. It’s an excellent opportunity for you to learn about their past projects, expertise, culture, and app development best practices.
Step 6 - Ensure requirements align
No matter how technically-adept the developers are, your project risks getting side-railed if they are not aligned with your business requirements. Ensure that the developers understand your business and streamline the app towards it.
Step 7 - Sign the contract
Once you’ve pronounced yourself satisfied with the selected candidate, you kick off the collaboration with a legally-binding contract.
Why Choose Uptech as Your Offshore Development Team
Uptech has a stellar reputation as an offshore app development company. Our team is based in different corners of the world: Poland, Austria, Denmark, and Asian countries. , We have worked with startups and established companies from various regions.
- GOAT, Aspiration, Dollar Shave Club – USA
- Eatable – Sweden
- Nomad – UAE
Co-founders are attracted to our values, where we take a user-centric approach to app development. We believe in affirming ideas with facts, which means validating assumptions from customer feedback.
We’ve thrived in a vibrant IT outsourcing industry throughout the years and have worked with 150+ startups from 12 countries. Uptech is led by a team of highly skilled IT experts that have worked with startups in various industries (healthcare, fintech, on-demand, social, and real estate).
Throughout the years, we’ve helped clients build apps from scratch. For example, Yaza is a mobile app that allows real estate agents to record and share video home tours. We worked with Yaza’s US team to turn their ideas into an app through short, iterative development cycles. Featured in Realtor Magazine and RISMedia, Yaza’s success is attributed to user feedback during the development stages.
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We’re equally proud of another startup’s brainchild, Aspiration. Aspiration is a socially-conscious financial app that allows users to donate to environmental causes when they shop. Our team helps to turn the idea into functional iOS and Android apps.
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Summary
Offshore developers are in demand, and they will empower startups to reach greater heights in fast-paced economies. We’ve shown your convincing reasons to hire offshore software development teams and where you’ll find them. If you want to shorten the time to market without compromising on quality, offshore development is the answer.
Uptech is ready to help you hire offshore developers and bring your bold idea to life. Talk to our team now and learn how we can help your startup.