**Why is Pakistan the hot new offshore information technology (IT) destination? **
This is because of a combination of favorable economic circumstances. Just when many Western managers are finally becoming comfortable with the idea of working closely with Indian IT firms, along comes Pakistan.
Pakistan is shaking off decades of “also ran” status. Funds invested into building educational institutions in Pakistan (when there were not enough jobs to absorb all the graduates from those institutions) are paying off as Pakistan begins to field a modern, highly productive labor force that is the envy of more prosperous but less tech savvy nations elsewhere in the region.
Pakistan offers five advantages over India:
1. Western experience: Executives at IT firms in Pakistan often have worked and gone to school in the U.S., which is Pakistan’s largest export market. Indian IT firms whose managers have worked in the West are generally more expensive than similarly positioned Indian firms, without always providing noticeable differences in program implementation capabilities. The willingness of Pakistanis to return home from the West stands in marked contrast to most Indians who arrive for school or work in the West and never look back.
**2. Professionalism and integrity: **The personal integrity of Pakistani managers is easy to identify and appreciate, especially by Westerners with business experience elsewhere in the region. However, the relatively open and trusting nature of Pakistanis has made them easy prey for Indian business brokers who have managed to cheat several Pakistani IT firms by offering to provide them with outsourcing contracts in exchange for up-front fees. The Pakistanis assumed that these Indians were open minded and charitable for coming to help less experienced firms in Pakistan gain access to international contracts, until the Indians took their money and disappeared.
3. Higher labor availability: Fewer holidays in Pakistan means less slippage in staff availability compared to India. IT firms in India are advised to hire a diverse workforce so that members of one community can enjoy important festivals while members of other communities cover the phones and keep production going.
4. Good accents: Pakistan’s official language is English. Only Kolkata (formerly Calcutta) and the Punjabi areas of India can come close to competing with accents in Pakistan, where many families speak English at home and where accent neutralization for non-native speakers of English is substantially easier than in India. Language skills and accents provide Pakistan with a major advantage over all other Asian outsourcing destinations.
5. Low cost talent pool: India’s top-tier labor force for IT work has been stretched thin in many areas, especially Bangalore, where escalating wage rates, turnover and higher outsourcing prices are reaching critical mass at the same time that the urban infrastructure has exceeded its carrying capacity. Annual turnover rates reported to InternationalStaff.net for most merchant call center facilities in India at the beginning of November are approaching 100 percent. High turnover rates are causing a shift to second tier Indian cities and to Kolkata. Escalating turnover rates are one of the Indian outsourcing industry’s dirty secrets. In comparison, Pakistan’s top-tier talent pool is largely untapped and turnover rates are less than 20 percent.
Here is the Link to find out more,…Its a long Article,…I just posted highlighted stuff,…
tariq…pleeeeease stoooop! what? pakistan hot IT outsourcing location? 
eek: