The Irish Bridge: A two-sided perspective on the customer-vendor relationship in offshore sourcing

Based on Relational Exchange Theory (RET), this paper explores the dual role in offshore sourcing as experienced by an Irish software development company. As part of a large US based company, the Irish site acts as a “bridge” in their offshoring practices. While the US site offshores work to Ireland, the Irish site – acting as the bridge – offshores work further to India. Hence, the Irish site has experience of being both customer and vendor in an IS offshoring relationship. The study reveals elements for a successful offshoring relationship and presents lessons learnt from the dual “bridge” role that emerged in our study. Furthermore, it is questioned whether this bridge role will be a viable model also in future offshoring arrangements. While temporal location will always work in Ireland’s favour and be an advantage, location alone will not be enough to keep position in future offshoring arrangements. Instead, depth of expertise and experience will be even more important for future competiveness. Ireland is not a low-cost destination anymore and therefore, will need to maintain quality to maintain its position as a successful “offshoring bridge”.