As I’ve commented frequently, getting accurate information about the staff size and financial performance of Chinese software outsourcing vendors is a real challenge.  The effort isn’t helped any when you have groups like the IAOP providing lists that don’t explicitly acknowledge that they are a pay-to-play organization.  I tried to find the source data for this on their website, but I eventually got frustrated and gave up, so I’ll just quote from IndiaPRWire:

“China’s largest outsourcing companies by number of employees are: Achievo, Beyondsoft (Beijing), Bleum, CompuPacific International, Dalian Hi-Think Computer Technology, hiSoft Technology International, Inspur, Longtop International, Neusoft Group and VanceInfo Technologies.”

Well, it looks to me like the list is in alphabetic order, rather than in order of staff size.  Even so, it neglects to include some of the largest companies, including (in alphabetic order): Augmentum, Chinasoft,
Dextrys (formerly DarwinSuzsoft), Freeborders, iSoftStone and Longtop Financial (LFT).  I don’t know how to account for this oversight.  However, the IAOP’s past policy was to only include companies on their list that were IAOP members, or sponsors, so we might want to consider their list with some skepticism.

When we’re comparing staff sizes for Chinese vendors, it is often important to dig a little beneath the surface.  Some questions that you might want to ask when selecting a vendor, include:

• Does your count include employees of partner companies, associated companies, companies in your “network”, subcontractors, or does it truly represent your actual employees?
• Does stated size of your resource base represent the number of technical staff members that are actually available for outsourcing, or does it include your internal IT department, developers that work on your products, etc.?
• Are you giving me the actual number of engineers, or are you including administrative staff and non-technical resources in the count?
• Does this headcount accurately reflect the potential pool of resources for my project?  If your vendor’s primary client base is within China, they may have a very limited resource base that is suitable for Western projects.
• Do your figures include staff with “non-traditional” credentials, or does it count only your degreed engineers?
• Are you including interns, staff in training, and/or probationary employees in your stated headcount?
• Is this the count of actual employees at this time, or is it your projected headcount for some point in the future, or is it what your headcount would be if you had no attrition, or…?

If the size of your vendor’s resource base is an important part of your decision process, you’ll be well served if you muck around a little bit below the surface.

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