Dispelling Outsourcing Myths for Scandinavian Startups

Denmark, and specifically Copenhagen, is increasingly becoming one of Europe’s major startup hubs that gave birth to some of the world’s most successful startups such as Endomondo, Admazely, Zendesk, etc. No secret that growing a high-tech startup into a successful venture is not as easy as baking a cake (though baking a cake may be very challenging for some people, too). The early startup stage is usually the toughest one, as companies need to create a compelling value proposition, a realistic marketing plan, choose the right business model to ensure scalable customer acquisitions, etc. In parallel, they need to develop a sustainable software product and make sure it is improved, functionality-enhanced and upgraded on a regular basis, as well as having the right look and feel to attract the target audience. Most of today’s business solutions offered by innovative startups are based on web and mobile, which explains a rapidly growing demand for respective software development resources within the Danish startup community.

High cost of domestic IT resources and slow time to market as a result of IT Talent shortage are the two key challenges of in-house software development in Denmark, according to the 2012 Danish IT Outsourcing & In-House Software Development Survey. Realizing that outsourcing can be one good option for Danish startups to offer a truly state-of-the-art product to consumers and access new revenue generation sources faster than the competition, Silicon Vikings held a knowledge sharing event on Web / Mobile App Development Outsourcing in Copenhagen on August 29^th, 2012. Being an organization that connects the Nordic region’s business and technology sector to Silicon Valley through networking and collaboration, Silicon Vikings invited 3 Danish outsourcing service providers (and Ciklum was one of them) to present their business models and case studies of successful adoption of outsourcing to Scandinavian startups. One of the event’s goals was to dispel some common myths that outsourcing can only be effective for large companies and is a real pain in the neck for small and immature ones.

The event gathered more than 50 Scandinavian technology entrepreneurs and startups willing to get some valuable insights into how to tailor outsourcing to their internal processes. Over 10+ years of proving nearshore software development and IT consulting services (e.g. Agile, DevOps) we at Ciklum have accumulated best practices of cooperation with startups and used the Silicon Vikings event to share these practices with the interested entrepreneurs. We have helped some of the European startups mature and grow into financially stable SMEs, thanks to their high-quality and award-winning software products. These startups include Reevoo, now a leading social commerce platform, Udozi, now one of the leading product search platforms, Layar, now the world’s largest augmented reality platform, and many others. The last startup to have joined Ciklum clients community is Autobutler.dk, a motor repair and service center portal founded only 2 years ago in 2010. This year the company has already won two prizes for their services at E-Handelsprisen 2012, Denmark’s annual e-commerce award.

On September 18-19^th my colleague and I will be attending IT-Messen 2012 in Oslo, Norway’s largest IT event, and will be happy to meet and share with companies some useful ins and outs of how to smartsource nearshore IT resources to boost their business success.

About Sunniva Hessen, Marketing Coordinator, Ciklum Norway (1 Posts)