Offshoring de servicios técnicos de ingenieríael caso español

Abstract

In the early 2000, Spain became a reference country for the engineering services market, the fast-paced market changes generated a deficit of qualified and experienced workers. In consequence, many Spanish companies needed to look at the international market to have access to the required talent, and some of them set-up onshoring, outsourcing and/or offshoring initiatives; which over time could evolve towards offshoring outsourcing or insourcing centres. However, almost all of these initiatives disappeared. This investigation includes a 360º research study (including contracting party supplier final customer). The research presents the situation, the perspectives for the offshoring of engineering services as a strategic alternative, and a business model that enables a successful offshoring strategy. The study shows the strategic orientation of the Spanish engineering sector, its interests, the need for international expansion, its growth, the quest of talent, its position in reference with the offshoring, as well as the key factors to select a country to operate directly or indirectly. The research provides the first offshore cost-productivity comparative analysis for the sector, which shows that the offshoring process is a valid option - from the technical and cost perspectives - for the Spanish engineering companies. The research develops a framework model that eases the implementation of this business strategy, that creates a feedback loop, which evolves with the company. Based in the DRM model of Blessing y Chakrabarti (2009), its graphic system allowed the visualization of the interactions among the different factors and facilitated the basis that supported the relationships in the framework model. The application model ensures the technological memory update, the knowhow consolidation and the learning. The 360º study allowed to compare the opinion of suppliers and contractors. The important differences and requirements were gathered and integrated as an important insight for the development of the model. The final customers indicated that the offshoring is not relevant for their organisation, as long as the services have a competitive price and required quality