Uruguay is now among the thirty leading locations for offshore services, according to Gartner’s 2014 analysis of offshore destinations. Thus, the country repeated the good performance achieved in 2013. Uruguay is one of the eight countries in Latin America which is included in the report and one of the five distinguished countries in South America, along with Argentina, Brazil, Chile and Colombia.Offshore services or Export Global Services come out of companies’ decision to decentralize an activity and/or process. Some of the advantages they entail include: improve the cost-benefit ratio, time complementarity and the possibility to reach new markets.

The report selects thirty countries for offshore services on the basis of ten categories. These categories are assessed by country, which receives one of the following scores: poor, fair, good, very good, excellent. Uruguay stands out for not ranking «Poor» in any category, and it is the second country after Costa Rica with at least «Fair» ratings among the eight countries of the region (two categories).

Uruguayan economy stands out in the «political and economic environment» category and was upgraded in the «Education» category, where it reached a «Good» rating. In turn, it is the only country in the region, along with Costa Rica, to reach a «Good» rating in «Data and Intellectual Property Security and privacy».

Uruguay has an Export Global Services support program which is executed by Uruguay XXI and funded by the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB). The program is designed to contribute to the development of the export global services market in Uruguay through investment and export promotion actions, generation of labor skills, update of regulatory framework and assistance to key sectors oriented to industrial growth.

According to the Report on Investment Opportunities for Export Global Services prepared by Uruguay XXI, the exports of global services in 2012 reached approximately US$ 750 million, which accounts for 56% of the total exports of non-traditional services.

The Report on Investment Opportunities for Export Global Services prepared by Instituto Uruguay XXI is available here.