This is my first post in English, so since I used not to write in this language I will be slightly shorter than in my Spanish posts. The point of today is the extent of globalization in software industry innovation, nowadays the software production could appear to be as globalized as some manufacturing industries, such as electronics or clothing.
Somehow engineering or design people are still in Europe or the US but manufacturing / production are outsourced offshore in low-wage countries like India, Vietnam or China.
In 90’s after the so called Kodak effect outsourcing of some tasks in IT departments were a common practice, as consequence some developing countries (called underdog countries, and the most popular cases where India, Brasil or China), in particular India became stronger in IT workforce.
But, as some of IT tasks were offshored, were the innovation (design) as well outsourced in this low-cost countries (called underdogs). The answer is no, basically the innovation were done in the places nearest the customer, this is the reason why Israel so skilled in security software industry (due to the demand from Isaraeli forces), this way the US keep being leader in software patents.
So, is there any room to grow for these underdogs countries?, yes but they will start innovating products and services in their local countries (by the way, which is not a bad thing because its population potential of countries like India, Pakistan or Brazil).
As conclusion, my opinion is that outsourcing in developing countries are positive due to the develop country’s ITC industry but not because of foreign countries relay the innovating processes offshore, but this news skills can be used to develop local ITC products, services, infrastructure and mainly ITC local knowledge, in this process innovation will be present and depending on the strength of the market of this services I could become into first-class in some IT disciplines as we saw in cases as Israel or Ireland.
