May 31 – June 2, 2006, Moscow
The latest summit of Russian software developers was dedicated to the possibilities and prospects of domestic software field and particularly the export of products and services.
Among the participants of the forum there were representatives of the largest Russian companies as well as foreign customers and business analysts. One of the main points of discussion was the role of Russian software export compared to that of the regions – traditional IT suppliers (India, China).
According to experts’ estimations, the total revenue of Russian export in IT sphere reached 1 billion U.S. dollars by the year 2006. Despite the fact that Russia is still falling behind its eastern competitors in this figure, many western companies regard Russian developers as first-rate partners concerning the question of business processes optimization and solving complex IT problems.
As for the disadvantages of domestic software industry, foreign and Russian analysts emphasize shortage of qualified human resources (severe demographical situation being one of the reasons), the relatively small number of MBA and management specialists, the low rate of internal and external communication among executive managers. Nevertheless, high technological and scientific potential of Russia and cost-effectiveness of its software services traditionally act as attractive factors of domestic IT business.
Unfortunately, the stereotype of Russian market as a volatile structure implying economical and legal risks, as a rule turns out to be a stumbling-block when communicating with foreign customers and investors. However, those clients who have already been involved into interaction with Russian software developers, note the high level of responsibility and reliability of their Russian outsourcing partners. The summit participants admitted the necessity of coordinating marketing efforts in order to generate an “All-Russian success story”, which would aim at demonstrating the benefits of Russian software services and their correlation with international quality standards.