Nicolas Castelnau ( Transylvania Consulting )

NG : Romania’s image is improving constantly, and with time this country seems always more prized in offshore development sector. Which are its strengths ?

NC : First, technical people here are numerous and highly qualified, especially in IT sector. Then people are very flexible, eager to learn, which provides an excellent reactivity to satisfy clients needs. And last but not least, development costs are extremely competitive, even compared to costs from continents well known for this aspect...

NG : But these characteristics are common to many countries which propose offshore services...

NC : Romania also takes advantage of specific assets. The motto is proximity :
  Cultural proximity is obvious, Romanians are an old european nationality, with decreases much risks of misunderstanding and cultural gaps with clients.
  Geographical proximity, the time difference is only one hour with Western Continental Europe, and clients can meet very quickly « their » development teams when they wish it.
  Administrative proximity, project managers are extremely mobile, they can easily attend meetings at their clients headquarters, there is no need for visa for small trips in Shengen zone and more and more neighboring countries.
  Eventually, language proximity, Romanian people have a very good knowledge of foreign languages. English language is not surprisingly on top position, but Latin languages such as French or Italian are commonly used, such as German, Hungarian languages, etc...

NG : Which are Transylvania Consulting’s key factors of success ?

Our vocation is to be the most efficient interface between eastern competences and western needs.
  The first key factor of success comes from management and methodologies that come from western Europe. This increases efficiency, and improves to a large extend communication with western key accounts, thus reassuring them.
  The second factor is our perfect integration in the country where we produce our services. This is a decisive advantage compared to the case when a foreign company shall implement locally a brand new structure. As a matter of fact, in our case we avoid our clients the long and difficult search of reliable local contacts, the discovery of a new economical, legal and cultural environment, and the risks this attempts imply...
  The last one is the excellent quality of our technical team, and the fact that we ensure by ourselves all developments to keep a perfect control on quality and deadlines. This explains why we mainly work on long term partnership basis with our clients, they don’t have any reason to choose another supplier or to reconsider the choice to outsource offshore...

NG : Why did you not choose to operate in the country’s main city ?

There are very good universities and qualified people all over this country. Moreover Transylvanian people are well known for their seriousness and professionalism, and the absence of stress caused by life conditions in very large cities allow them to focus on their professional activity. Eventually, employees are very stable here, when a high turnover rate in large cities often becomes a handicap on mid or long term projects...