Outsourcing in general is an emotive subject - we're used to seeing newspaper headlines with the words "redundancies....call centre......Bangalore" and widespread perception is that offshore software development is bad for UK plc.

However, it seems it may be inevitable and a phenomenon that is here to stay. Companies can either embrace globalization or fail to compete. Last year, Microsoft collaborated with the British Computer Society and Lancaster University to produce a report on Developing the Future which addressed this as an issue. You can download our response to DtF here.

Our new Chief Business & Marketing Officer in the UK, Matthew Bishop, delivered a great keynote at our recent Offshoring event at St Martin's Lane hotel (nice venue btw). Read more about Matt's comments.

There are significant advantanges to be had for firms going down this route - interestingly "access to skilled labour" comes top of most lists of reasons companies do this; closely followed by "cost savings" as one might expect. Trestle Group have some useful research and the BCS has since published more guidance on the subject. CIO have good commentary.

Unishores, acting as one of our advisors for this initiative, provide assistance to companies looking to offshore.Their MD, Sanj Prabhakar, is a member of the NOA and the standards body ComQual.

Sanj writes about our experiences in October 2006 where we brought together people from India, Vietnam and the Philippines to meet with UK companies interested in exploring cross-border partnerships. QuickStart Global were one of the partners presenting at that event.

Much of the work we are doing is in partnership with Microsoft Philippines' developer partners and Harvey Nash - probably better known to most of us as one of the world's largest recruitment companies. Their software development centre in Vietnam has proved very popular with a good proportion of our UK ISV community. Read their Three Top Tips on the process here.