Expertise Management In A Distributed Context - The Case Of Offshore Information Technology Outsourcing

The offshore outsourcing of information technologies (IT) started in the 1990s, following the outsourcing trend in manufacturing industries. In particular, the recent trend has been characterized by offshoring of various IT processes and services to external contractors at offshore locations. Indeed, low labour costs combined with the search for skilled workforces have promoted a shift in strategic IS development toward considering outsourcing to offshore locations. In doing so, firms have set up development centers in India and Israel and have more recently considered the Philippines, China, and other countries. In recent years, the scale of outsourcing projects has increased significantly as the considerations involved in outsourcing to offshore locations have been extended from simple and repetitive tasks and processes to those that involve strategic and knowledge-intensive activities (Quinn, 2000), such as the development and implementation of strategic IT systems. Full paper available at https://link.springer.com/chapter/10.1057%2F9780230582408_5