
Is India's computer-services industry heading for a fall? - nickb
http://www.economist.com/business/displaystory.cfm?story_id=10286436
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gruseom
The article doesn't mention the biggest problem with this industry: it's built
on a mistake. Software development isn't manufacturing and programmers are not
factory workers. The "hire hundreds of cheap programmers" story was good for a
first round of sales, but it doesn't work, and that's not good for long-term
business.

I've talked to people involved in half a dozen such projects and they all said
the same thing: the overhead of coordination was greater than the cost
savings, and the quality of the work was low.

The point is that this approach doesn't do any better there than it does here.
The grass just seemed greener on the other side of the fence. As one executive
put it, "Why should I pay $20 million for nothing here when I can buy it from
India for 15?"

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geebee
"Today more Indian than American firms meet _the highest internationally
recognised standards_ for software development."

Is this in reference to the CMM model?

I'm not sure exactly what the economist is referring to by the "highest
internationally recognized standards for software development." Sounds
impressive, which probably means it's a lot of complete bull$%&#.

