HIGH CHINA STAFF COSTS PROVE HURDLE FOR TCS

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India's biggest IT outsourcing services company has encountered significantly higher staff costs and turn-over in China than in its home market, suggesting China's ambitions to establish itself as a major outsourcing provider will not easily be achieved.

Executives at Tata Consultancy Services told the Financial Times that, for many senior positions, engineers can command 50-70 per cent more money in China than in India.

“We were quite surprised by these numbers because the issue is not just the cost of the individual but also welfare costs [borne by] the company,” S. Ramadorai, TCS chief executive, said on the sidelines of the Boao Forum for Asia. “For some skills China is very expensive.”
Girija Pande, who runs TCS's Asia Pacific operations, added: “If you want to operate in China, you have to operate at Chinese costs. Our costs are not higher than our competitors'.”

TCS must also contend with annual staff turnover of 18 per cent in China, compared with 10 per cent in India.

“We're not used to such a high attrition rate but that's the way the market is,” Mr Pande said.

India's annual IT outsourcing exports have reached $33bn against $2.5bn in China, which, unlike India, is also handicapped by a paucity of English-speaking engineers.

In an effort to close this gap, China's National Development and Reform Commission last year invited four overseas companies to tender for the right to form a Beijing-based joint venture with Microsoft and three Chinese companies: Uniware, Beijing Zhongguancun Software Park Development, and Tianjin Huayuan Software Area Construction and Development.

After TCS won what its executives described as a “beauty parade”, the company agreed to wrap its wholly owned China operation – established in 2002 – into the joint venture.

TCS today employs 800 engineers in centres in Beijing, Shanghai and Hangzhou, the three cities where China's nascent outsourcing industry has clustered. Globally it has 89,000 employees.

印度塔塔咨询服务有限公司(Tata Consultancy Services，简称TCS)在中国遇到了员工成本和流失速度明显高于其本土市场的问题，这显示中国要将自身打造成主要外包服务提供国的雄心并不容易实现。TCS是印度最大的IT外包服务企业。

TCS的高管对英国《金融时报》表示，对于许多高级职位，工程师在中国的收入可能比印度高出50%至70%。

“这些数字令我们非常惊讶，因为问题不仅仅是个人成本，还有公司承担的福利成本，”TCS首席执行官拉玛多拉尼(S.Ramadorai)在博鳌亚洲论坛期间表示。“在中国，某些技能的人力成本非常高。”

TCS亚太业务主管吉瑞加•潘德(Girija Pande)补充道：“如果想在中国开展业务，你必须按中国的成本运作。我们的成本并不比竞争对手更高。”

TCS还必须应对中国每年18%的员工流失率，而这一比率在印度为10%。

潘德表示：“我们并不习惯如此高的流失率，但中国市场就是如此。”

印度每年的IT外包出口已达到330亿美元，而中国仅为25亿美元。与印度不同，中国还面临另一个阻碍：缺乏说英语的工程人才。

为缩短差距，中国国家发改委(NDRC)去年邀请了4家海外企业竞标，获胜者有权与微软(Microsoft)和3家中国企业组建一家总部位于北京的合资企业。这3家中国企业是：大用软件(Uniware)、北京中关村软件园发展有限责任公司(Beijing Zhongguancun Software Park Development)和天津华苑软件园建设发展有限公司(Tianjin Huayuan Software Area Construction and Development)。

TCS赢得了这次竞标。该公司高管将这次竞标形容为“选美”(beauty parade)。获胜后，该公司同意将其2002年在中国成立的独资企业融入合资公司。

目前，TCS在北京、上海和杭州这3个中国新兴外包业聚集的城市都设立了中心，聘有800名工程师。TCS在全球有8.9万名雇员。