Bulgaria lands in Top 20 of global outsourcing destinations

Bulgaria has entered for the first time A.T. Kearney's annual ranking of the most attractive locations for 'offshoring' of service activities such as IT, business processes and call centers.

Bulgaria ranks 15th among 40 destinations included in the Global Services Location Index.

Slovakia and Romania also make the list, slotting in at no.16 and no.24, respectively, reflecting the trend to move farther East in search for high-skill, low-cost solutions as costs in the most advanced Central European countries converge toward EU-levels, said the global management consulting firm.

Outsourcing operations in Bulgaria are expected to increase by 30-40% in 2006, said Zlatolina Mukova from Sofica Group, a local company that opened a call center in Business Park Sofia earlier this year.

Bulgaria offers a good mix of high skills, low labour costs and good production quality, said Siemens Bulgaria manager Stoyan Neshev.

Siemens recently invited a competition for the outsourcing of production activities to Central and Eastern Europe. The German concern is expected to name by the end of 2005 the Bulgarian companies that will receive some of the outsourcing contracts.

Bulgaria's tailoring industry also has great potential to accept outsourced business but is impeded by the lack of fabric manufacturers. Hence 90% of the needed fabrics have to be imported.