What is Nearshore App Development?
Nearshore app development consists of receiving work or services performed by agencies located in countries that are geographically close to you. For instance, businesses in the United States may choose to outsource their app development projects to Colombia, Mexico, or Canada.
Contrastly, offshore development entails the outsourcing of work to countries that are much further from the client’s HQ. For example, if a US company chooses to outsource their app development to an engineering team in India, this is considered offshoring.
Nearshore outsourcing is preferable over offshore outsourcing for many reasons. In this article, we’ll address the benefits of working with a nearshore app development partner.
4 Reasons Why You Should Be Working with a Nearshore App Development Partner
1. Both your team and the nearshore development team will be in similar time zones.
As discussed in our article about the pitfalls of offshoring, working with a team in a time zone that is either the same or at least close to the one that your core team is in, can make all the difference.
If you choose to work with an offshore partner, your two teams will be working on opposite schedules. This opens up a potential for miscommunications, as well as significant slowdowns to your project since it will be difficult to communicate with an offshore partner in real time.
On the other hand, if you work with a nearshore team, all members of the project will be online during business hours. This makes it much more convenient to collaborate by bouncing ideas off of one another via phone calls, instant messages, and video conferences.
If you aim to work with an Agile development methodology, then a nearshore app development team is essential. If your outsourced team is offline whenever you’re awake, how can you expect to maintain weekly standup meetings and other processes that solidify project effectiveness and efficiency?
2. Language and cultural barriers are eliminated by nearshoring.
With a nearshore development team, you’re much less likely to experience miscommunications than if you were to choose an offshore app development partner.
With geographical proximity comes cultural relevance. If you work with a nearshore team, chances are much smaller that you’ll end up providing critical feedback that is then interpreted as offensive or disrespectful.
3. Nearshoring usually ends up being less expensive than offshoring.
One of the driving factors for companies looking for an offshore development team is that they want to keep their costs low.
A Deloitte survey recently showed that 59% of businesses that outsource development did so to cut costs. And for the IT sector, this stat leaped to 87%.
Contrary to popular belief, nearshoring actually ends up being less expensive than offshoring in most cases.
While the upfront costs of development may appear cheaper when evaluating offshore development partners, don’t let this fool you. In reality, working with an offshore team will result in miscommunications, inefficiencies, and project slowdowns that will end up costing your business money.
Plus, if an unqualified offshore team builds sloppy code, you’ll just end up paying more money to get it fixed.
4. Your intellectual property will be protected under laws and regulations that you’re familiar with.
A big fear amongst companies that choose to outsource development is that their code will then be repurposed by their outsourcing partner on future projects.
If you choose to work with a nearshore development team, you can rest assured that the intellectual property resulting from your project will belong entirely to you.
A nearshore team will understand your region’s intellectual property laws, and will be able to commit to abiding by them without hesitation.
Final Thoughts
If you’re debating whether to work with a nearshore or offshore app development team, you’re better off choosing to go with nearshoring.
Koombea has a fully staffed nearshore team of experienced, qualified developers. Over 11+ years, we’ve successfully delivered over 500 digital solutions to the world’s leading companies.
If you’re curious to learn more about our services, feel free to schedule a free 30-minute consultation. During the consultation, we will discuss the current state of your project, and prescribe the best route forward to ensure your team’s success.
