German cars are forever, or so they say.

Consider The BMW Group : the leading luxury carmaker produces cars across 30 sites in 14 countries on 4 continents. All the while and across the board, there’s no compromise in quality, safety, manufacturing processes, vendor management, and social responsibility.

That’s BMW Group’s production network for you.

So, why are we talking about BMW and its expansive network here?

It’s about economies of scale, efficiency in processes and distribution, and manufacturing.

Think about what goes into manufacturing a car: there’s research, conceptualization, and development. Then there’s raw material and parts sourcing, production, and scale. Following that, there’s safety, testing, marketing, and distribution.

BMW does design, research and development at its home base in Berlin. However, it sources parts from various geographic locales, tests its cars for safety, and innovates all the while. Plus, depending on the potent demand in various countries, it sets up plants and development centers in each of its high-demand locations.

Software development is nowhere as complicated as producing a car. Yet, we don’t see businesses approaching software development with the panache that BMW does it with.

We have a simple outlook to software development: if BMW can do it, so can you.

 

It’s time you look at software development much like BMW does. With so much going for Software development and with less than half the hassles global car companies have, let’s bring what we learn from global manufacturing success stories to regular software development and distribution.

See how it plays out:

Software Development Talent is Worldwide

As Rebecca O. Bagley of Forbes.com puts it,

“Our World is Powered by Software” 

We, however, believe that a varied pool of stupendous size powers all that software development. From Moscow to Mumbai, from Taiwan to Manila, and from Bangalore to Brooklyn, software development is thankfully attributed to the exceptional talent available Worldwide.

The U.S software talent pool is already facing competition. Not just from other countries that invest into software development education and producing professionals but also from the rise of the “Supertemp”, the “free agent nation”, and the “freelancing economy”, and the “independent professionals” , as Jody Greenstone Miller and Matt Miller write on HBR.

Software development talent pool is now global and countries like India, Brazil, and Philippines are all havens for finding the geeks you need for your next project, for more than half the cost. In fact, a NASSCOM report declares that the savings amount to almost 60% each year.

Consider India alone: apart from being rated as the best outsourcing destination, it’s also the largest professional and technical talent pool in the world with a projected 2.2 million skilled professionals in IT, Software, and Services sector by 2020 (Source: Nasscom).

Processes are in place
Software development has come a long way at the time of this writing and definite processes are in place – with emphasis on Agile Manifesto — such as Scrum Methodology, Crystal Clear, Extreme Programming, Feature Driven Development, Dynamic Systems Development, and a lot more. Global Software development approach doesn’t have a need to reinvent the wheel. You just have to get it rolling.

Communication in the new era of work
Meghan M. Biro of forbes.com writes that telecommuting is the new way to work. If you weren’t convinced, you’d only have to look at Red Hat and how it makes use of the distributed workplace.

All this is thanks to the new ways available to discuss, collaborate, plan, and execute work. Starting from Skype, continued dependence on email, and the ever-rising pool of SaaS applications such as HipChat, Slack, and many others to make teams communicate globally

An unprecedented change that has already changed the way many companies work today.

When you make global software development happen with remote teams and tapping into unique skill sets and the human cloud, your product go-to-market implementation is way faster.

Experienced developers from around the world (not to mention unique time zones and culture set) work on your project round the clock and lower costs 

So, are you going global yet with your software development?