High Quality/Low Cost
When Indian giant Wipro Technologies came looking to expand their presence in Brazil, one of the reasons they chose Curitiba was “the high labor force quality, at a low cost”, as Fernando Estrazulas, Head of Region-Latin America put it. An average salary for an IT worker would be anywhere from US$400 to $600 monthly. “Curitiba fits our global strategy perfectly. It allows us to serve both our international customers, as well as the strong domestic market here, all at wages less than in Sao Paulo or Rio”. Wipro inaugurated their new delivery center in Curitiba just last month. For Jacques Depocas, it’s not only about low labor costs. “There are excellent universities here that graduate a lot of quality talent – not just IT workers, but mainframe programmers which we need”, he says. “And if you’re talking about attrition, I have a 10% rate. In Sao Paulo it’s around 15%”.
The Challenge of Scale
While everyone we spoke to agrees on the high quality of the Curitiba workforce, opinions are divided on the scalability of that workforce. Technical training is becoming a huge issue across the region, but in Curitiba specifically the concern is whether universities can continue to graduate enough IT-specialized talent to support the growing demand of US customers, particularly in Silicon Valley. Benjamin Quadros from BRQ doesn’t think so. “Curitiba is good for small operations of a few hundred people, but if they’re looking to hire a thousand or more they just will not find the talent that they need”. Coincidentally that’s exactly what Depocas from HSBC Global Technologies is trying to do. He has 500 employees currently and needs to almost double that by the end of this year to manage his service volume. “The main problem is that the market is too small for the speed that I need to hire”, he admits. “It’s getting harder to find not just technically skilled workers, but ones who are also bilingual”. Curitiba does have a large immigrant population especially from Europe, but English proficiency remains low. Companies in Curitiba are finding solutions however. “Wipro can influence the local universities and establish partnerships and training programs to match our requirements for IT workers”, says Estrazulas. “Curitiba already has the highest percentage of English schools per capita in Brazil”. Wipro currently has 400 employees in their delivery center, and Estrazulas is still looking only to hire locally. Depocas also works with Curitiba’s educational institutions. “My employees actually teach some of the technical IT courses at GrupoAméricas, a local Curitiba-based university. Then we choose the best students to come work for us”.
It’s a Brazil Thing
Many of the above challenges that we’ve always known about Brazil – low English proficiency, not enough higher-end IT workers – may be emphasized in Curitiba because of how quickly its outsourcing scene has grown. The IT industry is still organizing itself, and there will of course be a time gap between new training initiatives, and when those trained people are ready to work. The companies that we spoke to remain confident that Curitiba can produce the required talent, even if it takes some time. “We need to invest more in skilled talent. Society and government here needs to understand the importance of the ITO sector, and that’s a Brazil problem, not a Curitiba problem”, says Quadros. “Still, if you look at the outsourcing cities in Brazil, Curitiba is definitely one of the best”.