More and more companies (large enterprises, SME and startups) are considering Eastern Europe for outsourcing their software development tasks. With the number of existing offers in the market, it’s a challenge to find a reliable partner for software development. In this context, Ukraine has become a real hotspot.
According to the latest Tech Ecosystem Guide to Ukraine, released by Unit.City, there are over 185,000 Ukrainian software developers and 4,000 companies in Ukraine, turning the country into one of the top 20 software development outsourcing destinations and the largest exporter of IT services in Europe. Ukrainian developers and startups managed to raise nearly $290 million worth of investments in 2018. Among the most successful startups were GitLab, an open platform for software code repository management, Grammarly, a machine learning spell checker, and a Petcube, a service for remote interaction with pets.
“The total amount of investments in Ukrainian IT companies over the past 5 years amounted to $ 630 million, including with the participation of top world investors, which indicates the level of development and sustainability of the domestic industry despite the country’s economic and political problems,” said Managing Partner of AVentures Capital Yevgen Sysoyev.
Around 20% of the world’s leading companies like IBM, Microsoft, Samsung, Abby, eBay, Skype have their own R&D offices in Ukraine and hire Ukrainian software developers, while other world giants opt for resourcing Ukrainian IT talents. The USA is the main consumer of Ukrainian IT nearshoring services, representing 50% of the industry’s total exports. The second-largest market is the EU, with Germany and the UK the main partners, alongside Israel, another major buyer of Ukrainian software developers’ services.
So, why Ukraine is an attractive destination to nearshore your IT services? Let’s find out.
Strong technical education
The success of the Ukrainian IT industry, like any other business, is founded on qualified staff. Ukrainian universities turn out over 60,000 graduates of technical fields annually and the country occupies a leading position in the world with the number of certified IT specialists. It is also worth emphasizing that the diplomas issued by some major universities of Ukraine are well recognized not only in Europe but across the world.
Over 85% of Ukrainian developers have a university degree. Moreover, leading Ukrainian universities, with the support of business, are launching educational programs on the most promising areas of information technology like Data and Computer Science, Artificial Intelligence, Internet of Things. On the other side, a great number of Ukrainian software developers are motivated for constant self-education, reading professional literature, attending important IT events and taking online courses.
According to industry forecasts, by 2020, there will be about 240,000 Ukrainian software developers. This rapid growth is easily explained by the promise, prestige, and dynamism of the IT-sphere in Ukraine. There are also some benefits from the side of the work environment: from access to advanced technologies to modern offices and approaches to work.
English speaking professionals
In addition to possessing a university degree, over 80% of Ukrainian software developers have an intermediate or higher level of English proficiency. Most software development companies offer free English classes for their employees, thus ensuring smooth communication and better understanding with their foreign partners. In most cases, teachers are native speakers with international certification.
Tech skills diversity
Ukraine doesn’t just provide onshoring specialists highly qualified in their fields. Most Ukrainian IT experts are multidisciplinary professionals, skilled in a variety of technologies and popular programming languages including:
- C++
- JavaScript
- Swift
- PHP
- Scala
- Java
- React
- Node.js
- Python
- Ruby
- ASP.Net
Ukrainian software engineers are among the most diverse of any in the world. Regardless of what technologies your project may require, there is no shortage of qualified Ukrainian developers available to create a custom software solution.
Best price/Quality ratio
According to Gartner, Ukraine ranks first in Eastern Europe in terms of offshoring price-quality ratio. Ukraine and India are good outsourcing countries. They have highly skilled technicians who speak English well and have fairly moderate hourly rates. However, Indian IT teams often practice the same technological stack for years, and Ukrainian software developers are appreciated for their quality approach. This is our competitive advantage in software development outsourcing.
Geographical location
Located in the heart of Eastern Europe, Ukraine is a perfect spot for nearshoring. There are regular direct flights from Ukraine to major European tech hubs, each no longer than 2-3 hours. In addition to this, the foreign policy of Ukraine establishes visa-free entry for citizens of most other countries; likewise, Ukrainians do not need a visa to travel to the EU and some other countries, thanks to recent agreements signed between the Ukrainian and other governments. It helps to create an easy workflow between geographically dispersed teams, with face-to-face meetings helping parties to build strong personal and business relationships.
The time-zone is also convenient with only 1 hour of difference between Ukraine and EU countries, which benefits remote business because working hours coincide and there is no need for late-night video conferences.
Moreover, Ukraine is also a good choice for offshoring, because 7 hours of the time difference with North America guarantees more conveniently overlapping working hours (compared with India, for example).
Unicsoft experience
At Unicsoft, we have experience in outsourcing development services to companies located in different parts of the world. Our clients have been very happy and satisfied to have used our services and partnered with our reliable team.
Recently, our client – a startup from Singapore – visited for an onsite workshop at the Unicsoft office in Kyiv. They were looking for a blockchain partner in the Ukrainian market and found our company thanks to our experience, competencies, and strong market positioning as a reliable software development outsourcing partner. The aim of the workshop was to work on the analysis and architecture of the product. The team of Unicsoft experts and the client’s team worked on analyzing business goals, defining the use cases and interaction between potential customers and the solution, and identifying functional and system requirements. During the workshop, we figured out that they still have some non-blockchain tasks which require additional help – work with big data and visualization, data science, and the optimal choice of data processing models. Our advantage is that we already have significant expertise in these areas, and we immediately invited our data science experts to join the workshop and discussed possible solutions, which also had a strong impact for the client. And there’s a clear benefit to hosting in our office, rather than visiting the client’s facilities because being on-site we can always count on the support of additional specialist Ukrainian developers in different fields. The workshop lasted for a couple of days and we were able to communicate effectively on the goals and the needs of our partner, and thanks to our broad qualifications we have provided solutions in additional areas of the client’s project. After the workshop, our team studied the information obtained from the client and gathered during the workshop, and prepared documents describing functional requirements and high-level architecture. All requirements descriptions were sent to the client together with workshop notes and recommendations.
In general, we almost always recommend our partners to come to Kyiv, visit our office and get to know our team in person. We believe that face-to-face meetings are very important, especially in the first phases of collaboration, in order to create a better understanding between the parties. We use a variety of techniques and in an interactive manner, we can more closely understand the special needs of each client.
While preparing the visit, Unicsoft team also helped our Singapore partner with the visa application and to find accommodation. Our colleagues from Singapore enjoyed Ukrainian culture and food. They optimized the time spent on business and received great results. They also enjoyed some free time and sight-seeing, learned the rich history of Kyiv, appreciated the great cuisine, and were warmly hosted by our smart, talented, and well-educated colleagues.
Another of our clients from the Netherlands was looking for Ukrainian developers for an IT offshoring partner and was equally impressed by our company’s experience and portfolio. He combined his business visit to meet the team in person with a tour to Chernobyl. After seeing the HBO TV series, the historical site was especially interesting to him. The Dutch client was very excited about the trip and the information he learned from the tour guide. In his own words about his experience visiting Chernobyl: “It was something incredible, scary, devastating, and charming at the same time”. While meeting with our team, he discussed software development outsourcing work plans for the next few months and set priorities and tasks for the team. He is already planning the next visit to our office and will surely combine work and pleasure, reserving a couple of days for sightseeing in Kyiv.
Consider working with Ukrainian IT Service Companies
Ukraine has a plethora of capable, dedicated development teams ready to put their time and effort into strengthening the technology and processes of your business with nearshoring.
Ukraine’s IT sector offers highly skilled experts and qualified education that contribute to the further dynamic of this sector.
Responsibility, hard-working and hospitable – these are the characteristics that describe our personality when it comes to the provision of services or products. It is in our nature to do our best in order to deliver the best software development services and product within short time-frames. And our foreign partner will never have any cultural barriers thanks to Ukrainians western orientation and good knowledge of English. You will always find a specific technical specialist – Ukraine has a pool of highly qualified and multi-skilled specialists in software development, so you’ll spot them here for sure!
Are you looking for software developers or need custom software development services? Send us a request and we will respond and deliver your digital needs fast!
