Egypt ‘new hotspot for IT outsourcing’

Cairo: Egypt is increasingly being noticed for its IT outsourcing capabilities in the global market, says an expert.
“Egypt is fast carving a position for itself among global IT outsourcing players, and Egyptian software development companies are increasingly attracting business from the Gulf region in particular,” says software development company Link Development CEO Hanan Abdel Meguid.
“We expect it to become the number one choice for the Gulf countries within the next few years and a very viable outsourcing option for Europe.”

Link Development is Egypt’s premier software development company and is a subsidiary of Internet Service and Solutions provider LINKdotNET and Telecommunications giant Orascom Telecom Holding Company.
According to a recent report by research company Yankee Group, Egypt is poised to become “the new India of the Middle East”.
It is on its way to become a serious contender in the IT and BPO (business process outsourcing) arena, exporting software development and call centre solutions to countries not only within its own backyard of the Middle East, but increasingly venturing into the neighbouring continent of Europe.
This growing interest from the GCC countries to outsource to Egypt, rather than India or Europe, has led to the region accounting for 29 per cent of all of Egypt’s projects by value, according to the Mediterranean Investment Project Observatory.
The Yankee Group report highlights the fact that “Egypt has a number of the required ingredients in place to become a major hub for IT outsourcing in the Middle East”, a view seconded by Abdel Meguid.
“We share a common language, a common culture, and geographical and time-zone proximity. Egypt has a large and well-skilled talent pool and offers a multilingual workforce that fits in well with the GCC and Europe. To become a nearshore outsourcing hub for the Middle East, Egypt and its IT service providers are not only geographically well positioned, but also have the right resources and infrastructure to make it happen,” said Meguid.
ITIDA, the Egyptian government’s IT Industry Development Agency, has set an ambitious target for the country to attract $1.1 billion of the global outsourcing market by 2010, quadrupling from its 2005 revenue.
As a member of ITIDA, LINK Development plays an important role in growing an export-oriented IT sector in Egypt.
Among the company’s initiatives is the development of an online developer community – www.barmagy.com – to encourage information exchange and collaboration among Egyptian developers.