Outsourcing: César Gon, Founder And CEO, CI&T (Part 1)

By Sramana Mitra and guest author Aditya Modi

About César Gon
Brazilian software entrepreneur César Gon has been a key player in several initiatives to promote excellence in software development. Under Gon’s leadership, CI&T’s roster of services has grown to also include business intelligence, SAP consulting, and digital marketing. The company has developed solutions for major global companies such as Coca-Cola, Google, Nestlé, and Honda.

About Ci&T
Based in São Paulo, Brazil, CI&T delivers consulting, application outsourcing and digital marketing services. It CI&T specializes in customized application development, business intelligence, SAP consulting, digital marketing and Web 2.0 applications. Its clients include a diverse array of large and global Fortune 500 customers in the United States, Canada, Brazil, Europe, Japan and China.

Sramana Mitra: Hi, César. Welcome to the Outsourcing series. To begin, would you tell us a bit about CI&T so that our readers have some context about the company and what it does? What kind of clients do you service, what kind of processes we are talking about? After that we will go into more detail. >>>

Outsourcing: Martin Migoya, CEO Of Globant (Part 7)

By Sramana Mitra and guest author Rajesh Nair

Sramana Mitra: What is happening in Buenos Aires? In 2007, I did strategic planning for MercadLibre, a client of mine. l learned a lot about what was going on in Buenos Aires then, and I learned at that time that entrepreneurship was about to happen in a big way. Are you helping younger entrepreneurs in Argentina? >>>

Outsourcing: Martin Migoya, CEO Of Globant (Part 6)

By Sramana Mitra and guest author Rajesh Nair

Sramana Mitra: What kind of investors have you been able to attract ?

Martin Migoya: Well, we have investors from Silicon Valley with private equity funds, which do not invest in early stage companies. They invest in companies that have the potential to grow, that are tapping into very large market opportunities with strong and solid delivery strategies. Those are the kinds of investors. In the case of Riverwood [and] FTV, they have other investments in the region. They know the region, and they trust our management team and the founder team. We have a great management team to take the company to the next level. >>>

Outsourcing: Martin Migoya, CEO Of Globant (Part 5)

By Sramana Mitra and guest author Rajesh Nair

Sramana Mitra: Who are your competitors and how do you compete with India’s players? There are players in India who are also focusing on these kinds of niche applications. They have different cost  structures, and in terms of cost structure, India still has an advantage over Latin America. So, how do you deal with pricing? >>>

Outsourcing: Martin Migoya, CEO Of Globant (Part 4)

Sramana Mitra: Interesting. I have spent a lot of time in Buenos Aires. One of the observations you are making is that there is more of an artistic blend, I suppose, in the workforce that you are trying to hire, and that workforce one that sits on the cusp of design and technology and is playing with mobile apps and so forth. What kind of role does the Latin American heritage of music and dance play in that? >>>

Outsourcing: Martin Migoya, CEO Of Globant (Part 3)

By Sramana Mitra and Rajesh Nair

Sramana Mitra: You are all over Argentina, so is the workforce in Argentina more distributed? Is the talent pool you are trying to tap more distributed?

Martin Migoya: No, it is not that way. For the most part, we grew first in Argentina; hence, we are distributed there and we made deep penetration into the deeper markets of Argentina. That is the same as what will happen in other countries. We started with Montevideo, Uruguay, but it is very important for us to keep on going to other cities. The same will happen in Bogotá and in other cities and countries where we start. >>>

Outsourcing: Martin Migoya, CEO Of Globant (Part 2)

By Sramana Mitra and guest author Rajesh Nair

Sramana Mitra: And that’s where you have succeeded, in doing mobile and social apps and user interface (UI)-intensive stuff and so forth, yes

Martin Migoya: Yes, exactly right.

Sramana:There are two questions that come to mind based directly on what you have just said. First, It is very difficult to work with remote developers, I guess remote partners, when you are dealing with issues like UI, dealing with aesthetics and design and things like that. So, if you look at the history of outsourcing, that is probably one of the areas that has seen the least amount of outsourcing. What are your comments about that? >>>

Outsourcing: Martin Migoya, CEO Of Globant (Part 1)

By Sramana Mitra and guest authors Rajesh Nair and Aditya Modi

About Martin Migoya

Martin Migoya is the CEO of Globant. Together with three of his friends, Martin established Globant, a company that desgins software products. Under Martin’s leadership, Globant grew from four people in 2003 to 1,500 today. He has won many awards such as Endeavour Entrepreneur 2005, Konex Award for the most innovative entrepreneurs of 2008, and Security Award for the most distinguished businessmen of the year in 2009.

About Globant
The fastest-growing software firm in Latin America, Globant, has become one of the top 10 software development companies in the world  since its inception just over seven years ago. With more than 2,500 employees it is headquartered in Buenos Aires and has offices in the U.S., U.K., Mexico, Colombia, Chile, and all over  Argentina. Globant’s clients range from software development and infrastructure management  to mobile applications and e-commerce. Globant has won awards for its innovation and its delivery model.

Sramana Mitra: Hi, Martin, and welcome to the Outsourcing series. To start with, we are definitely seeing outsourcing in Latin America as a major trend, which is why I wanted to speak with you. I would like to understand more about what you are seeing and how you are navigating your way through the outsourcing industry.

Martin Migoya: OK.

SM: So, let’s start with some background on Globant. Would you please tell me more about how and when you started and how you have built a sizeable company to this point. >>>