STRUCTURE OF THE ROMANIA IT INDUSTRY (Case Study Sample)

The structure of the Romania IT Industry Students Name Subject Professor Date STRUCTURE OF THE ROMANIA IT INDUSTRY Information technology involves usage of computers to perform different duties such as storage, transmission and retrieving of data mostly in business. All nations nowadays have turned to use technologies which have improved the quality of life. Technology is employed in doing most of the activities in the human life. Technology supports daily operations such as communication, transportation, entertainment, education, banking among others. It applies to both businesses and governments. These activities are possible with the use of the internet. (Cortada, 2010) Romania is one of the leading markets in technology in Europe with a highly skilled personnel and an environment that is stimulating. Romania is a market of information technology and is growing very fast. There has been a great improvement in the progress of information and communication technology subsectors such as IT and telecommunication sectors. Romania has the leading number of IT specialists in Europe with advanced technology standards. It also has many multinational corporations such as Microsoft, Intel, Oracle, IBM and Huawei among other and advanced education system which focus on software application and IT technologies. According to a survey done last year, it was noted that Romania has 14,000 IT companies and most of them are based in Bucharest and Cluj-Napoca. From the survey, Romania generated a total revenue of EUR 4 billion from the IT and technology companies. This was 26 percent more from the previous year which was 2013. The estimated number of employees is 100,000 as it has more employees and expecting to train and employ more. Romania is one of the attractive places for the IT market and technology development in Europe. Here is an overview of Romania and the surrounding countries. The IT sector has a steady growth supported mainly by the outsourcing companies. Romania is located at the East of Europe, which is one away from Berlin. The country is technology hub supported by the government for economic growth. Romania offers fair prices to the outsourcing businesses, and the competition is very stiff. Romania pays IT employee’s fairly low salaries. The IT workers are highly skilled, and this makes outsourcing a reliable activity. The geographical location also favors outsourcing in Romania making it second regarding exports in the country. The country's IT sector has had more investors, and it's one of the leading outsourcing markets in the world. There are some benefits from the IT industries which include: * qualified personnel who can move easily * large market segment * readiness for mergers and acquisition * Access to funds from Europe. The vision of the Roman government is to ensure the quality of services provided by the IT sector is of high quality to attract more investors. The IT industry in Romania seems to be well positioned for the outstanding performance in the market. This includes notebooks, computers, and tablets among others. Price competition and steady income growth deepen the IT market to new segments of the population. Vendors tap into low computer penetration rate. Most companies are aiming to capitalize in Romania. Locals will benefit from the support of EU funding and deep internet cover. Companies in Romania with more than EUR 1 million include: Intel, IBM, HP, Freescale, oracle, lux oft and Microsoft .however, companies such as IBM have opened offices throughout the country, and it becomes easier to hire personnel. Other businesses that have opened offices throughout the country include HP, Endava, Amazon, Ubisoft, Alcatel-Lucent and Continental automobile. The enterprise market started to grow in 2014 after a slow down and unstable domestic conditions due to Eurozone crisis. The expectation from managers was high as they expected a growth of 17% in the year 2014 to 2017. Talent pool There are over 95,000 information technology and communication specialists at the national level. The technical education includes 5 of polytechnic universities that perform well, 59 domain-specific universities, and 174 colleges owned privately. Romanian universities have been top 3 in the IEEE Design Competition every year since 2001. The number of engineers per capita is greater in Romania than the US, India, China, or Russia. 27% of IT bachelor and master students start obtaining technical certifications while in college. The country of Romania is in the list of top 10 globally in the number of certified IT specialists, while almost 90% of IT professionals speak English. Romania is a hot spot for IT&C sector rapid development over the next decades. (Dobre, 2014) Bucharest, the biggest city in Romania, is the first position in the list as it has the majority of the IT companies. It gives 67% of the country's sales, 56% number of workers and over 60% of the country's GDP. It is followed closely by Cluj-Napoca. It ranks among the best cities for investments in IT. The main reasons that make these cities shine and have more investments are favorable costs, geographical accessibility and highly skilled personnel. Industry segments * Hardware- the number of PCs increases at a high rate in Romania. There are volumes of PCs produced and sold annually. In 2012 the estimated number of PCs sold was 880,000. This included the tablets and notebooks. According to the latest data available, ‘in 2012 it was estimated that local brands accounted for 40% of the tablet market by shipments. Local manufacturers such as Evolio, Allview, E-Boda and Serioux aimed squarely at the low-end of the market. The Romanian market is a price sensitive one and improving the specifications of low-cost tablets is expected to drive tablet penetration higher in 2014.' * Software- software commonly used are enterprise risk management (ERM) and supply chain management (SCM). In ERM bigger companies record a sale of 80%.ERM outperforms other software markets. Some businesses have shifted from software to cloud services and this gives them a boost in controlling costs. Adoption of software as a service in Romania was a success as it became the leading application in 2014 with 25%. It indicated success for products such as Microsoft Office suite. * IT services- there is an updated version of digital agenda which includes a projection for a total amount of EUR 2.4 billion from the information technology investments. This will lead to economic growth, job creation and a decrease in administrative costs. Government support The government of Romania has helped the IT industry in some ways namely: * Opening of foreign trade regime * Controlling prices * Introduction of a favorable tax rate on profit * Encouraging fair competition in the country. * Removal of tax for software employees * Job creation to the citizens * Public financing * Support investment in new technologies * Helps companies to participate in fairs and exhibition to promote export. Romania stands at position 6 in the country in regards to the number of specialists in information technology. Romania defeats UK, Canada and Germany regarding IT specialists. Higher education in the IT area is provided by 5 top polytechnic universities, 59 domain specific universities, and 174 private colleges, which together produce over 5.000 computer science and engineering graduates per year. The main academic centers beside the capital Bucharest are Cluj, Iasi, Timisoara, Brasov, Craiova and Sibiu. The level of professional training improves each day and it has enabled Romania to have more informatics. (Dobre, 2014) Romania is the second country regarding multilingual. Romania has collaborated with many multinational corporations due to its hospitality among other contributors. Various MNCs work in Romania as mentioned earlier. The MNCs that partner include Oracle and Siemens, which has over 2000 workforce. This is due to the flexibility and diversity in Romania that has encouraged this partnership and outsourcing. According to a report by Brainbench, Romania is located in the top 5 worldwide regarding skills in computer technical support, computer electronics, technical help desk, network technical support, LAN/WLAN communications, ASP.NET, HTML, PHP, network design, web development concepts and many others. To name some of the Romanian software products that have gained international recognition by winning awards in the global market, an example is BitDefender IT security, Transports ERP, antivirus protection, SIVECO's AeL eLearning platform, the Intuitext e-learning suite from Software and sales force automation solutions. (Dobre, 2014) IT companies in Romania offers expertise in technical areas and long to have a good and long-term relationship with their customers. They strive to do this to attract more investors and to meet the need of their customers. This is a strength that makes them different from their partners across the world. Other advantages include * Specialization of skills. * The size of the labor force * Lower cost of doing businesses in the region * Geographical proximity to the west of Europe * Software development Software development The primary software services that can be developed in Romania include security application, product design, technology application management systems, and development services among others. There has been a shift in outsourcing in the European countries and it has given Romania an upper hand regarding IT service provision. According to Employers Association of the software and service (ANIS), the software package market in Romania has a value of 433 million in 2012, and this is a 7.5% ...