Outsourcing In European Emerging Economies

Drawing on a range of European cases, this edited volume analyses the offshoring and outsourcing of foreign companies, with a focus on territorial embeddedness. The book opens by developing a theoretical framework and then presents a range of international case studies exploring the experiences of the service hub cities of Brno, Bratislava, Budapest, Krakow, and Prague. Attention is also given to internal and external determinants of embeddedness, with chapters on the employee perspective, the Fintech industry, corporate social responsibility, and the role of universities. This volume will be of interest to advanced students and researchers in regional economics, economic geography, innovation studies, industrial economics, European economics, and international business.

De-industrialization, accelerated by the financial crisis, is a long term process. The comparative advantage of emerging economies shifted towards more advanced goods and their growing populations commanded an increasing share in global demand. This shift towards a factory-free economy in high income countries has drawn the attention of policy makers in North America and Europe. Some politicians have articulated alarming views, initiating mercantilist or 'beggar-thy-neighbour' cost-competitiveness policies. Yet companies that concentrate research and design innovations at home but no longer have any factories there may be the norm in the future. This volume proposes an economic analysis of this phenomenon and includes 11 contributions which complement each other and tackle the problem from different angles. The evidence in this book suggests that de-industrialization is a process that happens over time in all countries, even China. One implication is that criticism of China is not likely to provide a solution to these long term trends. Another implication is that the distinction between manufacturing and services is likely to become increasingly blurry. More manufacturing firms are engaging in services activities, and more wholesale firms are engaging in manufacturing. One optimistic perspective suggests that industrial country firms may be able to exploit the high-value added and skill-intensive activities associated with design and innovation, as well as distribution, which are all components of the global value chain for manufacturing. Although this ongoing transformation of the industrial economies may be consistent with evolving comparative advantage, it has significant short-run costs and requires far-sighted investments. These include the costs to workers who are caught in the shift from an industrial to a service economy, and the need to invest in new infrastructure and education to prepare coming generations for their changing roles.

In order for foreign direct investment to have deep and lasting positive effects on host countries, it is essential that multinational corporations have close direct and indirect interaction with local firms. A valuable addition to the emerging literature on multinational-local firm interfaces, this book provides a number of case studies from emerging economies that examine such mutually beneficial business relationships and the policy measures necessary to support them.

Following drastic shifts in the spatial organization of goods production, increasingly fierce competition now forces firms also to look critically at how to organize the production of services. While digitization and advances in information and communication technologies have enabled firms to unbundle service production processes, the increased global availability of skilled labour allows for the relocation of ever more of these processes around the world. As a result, a new geography of services production takes shape: a geography that is defined by new interregional and international divisions of labour and held together by increasingly complex global services production networks. This book examines how the reorganisation of services production alters relations between and generates different sets of challenges and opportunities for economic development in the Global North and the Global South. Drawing from 11 case studies probing various aspects of services production in different parts of the world, the book brings out the remarkable heterogeneity and transformative capacities of services. It successively shows how global trade in services creates new interdependencies between services producing and services consuming regions; reveals how services help to mitigate the impact of and contribute to recovery from economic crises in the Global North; and demonstrates how services offshoring fosters economic development and service-sector driven modernisation processes in the Global South. The book’s openness to the heterogeneous and dynamic nature of services production enlarges our understanding of which particular services in which spatiotemporal context have the capacity to generate good jobs, contribute to productivity and drive economic growth. The book stands out from other books in the field in that it combines perspectives on services-driven transformations from both the Global North and the Global South and looks into the role of various services segments. Based on pioneering empirical research and original data it offers a timely contribution to this growing debate. The book provides valuable insights for students, scholars and professionals interested in services, services offshoring, services-driven growth, and socioeconomic transformations in the Global North and South.

The business services sector contributes heavily to European economic growth. Yet links between business services, and their role in economic growth remain under-explored. This volume provides a comprehensive approach from an applied economics perspective, covering with clear focus all the major mechanisms through which this contribution operates.

Seminar paper from the year 2004 in the subject Computer Science - Commercial Information Technology, grade: 2 (B), University of Mannheim (Information Systems), course: Industrialization of Software Development, 27 entries in the bibliography, language: English, abstract: Topic of this paper are the macro economic issues of offshore outsourcing. First inland and offshore outsourcing are described, especially focused on IT outsourcing. Then reasons for IT offshore outsourcing are illustrated. Popular offshore markets are introduced and the advantages are shown. In the next chapter, problems and risks of offshore outsourcing are explained. Both the more general view and IT specific problems and risks are described. Here general problems as well as problems of IT outsourcing are mentioned. Then consequences of the offshoring trend are illustrated. Apart from consequences for IT branch, especially consequences for national economies of western countries, e.g. Germany, are viewed in detail. There can be short term and long term consequences. Future offshore outsourcing trends help to understand the effects. The development of unemployment caused by offshoring is one main focus. Furthermore offshoring trends in other white collar work besides IT are shortly described. At the end this the paper develops an idea about possible solutions for western countries. Potential reactions of the government and suggestions on how to create new jobs are presented in detail. The paper finally ends with a small conclusion.

The Oxford Handbook of Offshoring and Global Employment deals with a key issue of our time: How do globalization, economic growth and technological developments interact to impact employment? The book brings together eminent authors from a wide range of countries around the world, drawing on their diverse academic and policymaking backgrounds, and specific national or regional settings to assess how global economic changes have affected employment opportunities. The book is unique in a number of ways - It has a global reach, presenting analyses and viewpoints from both developed and developing countries, from all continents; its timing and context is particularly instructive, since most papers are located in the aftermath of the global financial crisis; and it addresses a wide range of questions-How do different types of offshoring and global linkages impact employment? How is the skill mix of the labor force impacted by globalization? How do institutional structures and regulations influence the outcome of globalization in developed and developing countries? Individual chapters analyze how the impact of global linkages on national economies is mediated through a number of structural aspects of the economy - its institutional and industrial structure, its resource base, its predominant firm type, its comparative advantage, and its regulatory practices. The chapters in the book cover both manufacturing and services sectors, and many chapters also address policy issues regarding innovation and job creation.