How is The European Nearshoring Market Changing?

Is there a new world of nearshoring emerging in Europe? A recent feature by Ilan Oshri of Loughborough University in Computer Weekly has suggested that the market is changing fast, in particular as a reaction to every country sounding the same when making their sales pitch.

We have all been to those conferences where one country representative is talking about the advantages of their region over others, but when several regions do the same type of talk they do all sound the same. We have great people, we have universities, we have great companies. The same check-box of advantages is always ticked for every presentation about outsourcing to a particular region – so what is changing?

First, there is a big wave of repatriation taking place. Projects that were outsourced to far off locations are coming much closer to home so nearshoring is becoming a much more important strategy for European companies.

Second, a wider array of services can be delivered by suppliers today and this is especially true when the supplier is relatively close to the customer, so the range of services offered through nearshoring deals is becoming more diverse.

Third, companies are increasing their expectation on suppliers. A supplier is no longer just the lowest cost way to get a job done. Many suppliers are the expert in their field and are delivering a service that the client simply could not perform internally anyway. The clients are now expecting suppliers to offer ideas and new innovations. Nobody is talking about innovation as a nice to have function these days, it is becoming an expectation of nearshoring that the supplier can come up with ideas on how to do business better.

Professor Oshri raises some very interesting points in his article. He believes that nearshoring locations still attempting to compete on labour price are thinking with a very short term view of the world. The ability to offer expertise and advice to clients will become the single biggest advantage and this may also require clusters of expertise to develop. He cites some examples of regions where competing firms are operating in the same physical location, so even if it does not sound logical, it does mean that for each specialist activity there are areas where clients can go and confidently find the expertise they need.

I believe that we are seeing a new type of nearshoring emerging and all three of the points raised by the professor are playing out across Europe today. The final point is the most important though. Clients used to be so powerful that they could pick and choose and drop suppliers at will. Now the suppliers have some very detailed knowledge that the clients cannot manage without. Real partnerships are developing and that will lead to genuine innovation.

What do you think about the ongoing development of nearshoring in Europe? Please leave a comment here.