Gartner rates offshore outsourcing hot spots

Gartner on Thursday walked IT folks through its global sourcing--also known as offshore outsourcing--methodology in a spiel that was part informative and part subtle hint that the consulting and research firm offers these services.

Much of analyst Frances Karamouzis' talk at the Gartner Symposium ITxpo focused on the basics such as determining why you want to go offshore, what's the business impact and the people headaches you may encounter. But amid all the holistic models and other management-speak Gartner went all Consumer Reports with its ratings. The charts that follow are worth the price of admission (and maybe even worth the Gartner subscription).

Here's a look at Gartner's ratings for the Americas:

And Europe, Middle East and Africa:

And Asia Pacific:

Reading between the lines I wonder how many IT execs would seriously consider half of these locales including some of the up-and-coming countries like Morocco, Latvia, Egypt and Panama.

My hunch is that Gartner's chat is probably geared toward massive multinationals. But given Canada and India were really the only two that knocked Gartner's scorecard out of the park it may make sense to start there. Another looming question: How would states in the U.S. stack up? Would it make sense to stay at home and play the labor arbitrage game by state?