Challenges and realities of software development in China

Dr. Liu first offered his view on the current state of the software industry's development and in particular software outsourcing to China. Software prices and margins continue to drop. Coupled with this reality is Liu's view that "only 10-15% of software development is truly innovative and therefore suitable to be developed in Silicon Valley". As software development platforms and communication technologies, especially the Internet, become ubiquitous and affordable, distributed software development is becoming the rule.

China's challenges and advantages in software outsourcing

Compared to India, the leader in software outsourcing, China has its own distinct challenges. Chinese software companies have almost no U.S. customers for a number of reasons: language barriers, different working styles, customers' concern for software piracy, and the lack of experienced programmers and technical managers in China. Yet, China also has its advantages. Not only does it have a rapidly expanding domestic software market, but it also has a large pool of fresh engineering talent. "The key, therefore," asserted Dr. Liu, "lies in someone creating the right environment to train and build a local team to be able to develop and deliver world-class software products."

Augmentum's software development goals

This is what Augmentum has set out to accomplish. "...[W]e want to build a world-class, distributed development team for software product development... like the ODM model in the PC world..." declared Dr. Liu. Based on this vision, Augmentum's strategy hinges on its insistence to develop software for top US customers, such as Motorola, Business Objects, and PalmSource--and to rely primarily on local Chinese engineers. Explained Liu: "We want to make sure that the center of most of the people of that team is going to be in China, even though the locomotive, the teachers, is in the U.S., because that's where the leadership is in the software product development world."

Drawing on decades of experience developing top software teams at IBM and other companies, Dr. Liu detailed his company's efforts to attract the brightest local engineers and train them to be even better. He explained, "Culture and team is the true differentiation of Augmentum.... The real...challenge is to build the right culture with the right core team." The company insists on having no expatriates in their China operations but promoting close interaction between experienced mentors in the U.S. and the young teams in China, sometimes using some creative approaches for recruitment and training. For example, Augmentum puts all of its new hires under "a stress test" after hiring and proactively maintains an "upfront churn of at least 30%" in the first three-month period." Their end goal: "a world-class software development team that can bridge the East and the West but still has a cost structure comparable to local companies."

Liu's focus for the future

Despite experienced leadership, ties to leading U.S. companies, and strong young software teams, Augmentum faces real challenges. Liu acknowledged skeptics who question the ability to build a world-class team through working on the "crumbs of companies" of "projects they don't want to work on themselves." Nevertheless, he is confident in the trajectory of Augmentum's future growth, as the company is expecting to double its employees every year for the coming few years. In addition, Dr. Liu's vision includes a landscape beyond Augmentum. "I have a very simple focus. I want to train a lot of world-class software developers in China to serve the world. Many of them will not be working for Augmentum. It is fine...I want to bring my experience to there to make it happen. And the best vehicle to do that at this moment and time, the wave [that] I want to jump on is outsourcing, because it is growing the fastest."

Biography of Leonard Liu

Leonard Liu has spent 30 years in the systems industry, with a track record of developing innovative computing technologies into successful businesses. Most recently, he served as president of ASE Group, a leading provider of IC test and packaging services, having held roles as Chairman and CEO of Walker Interactive Systems, COO of Cadence Design Systems, and President of Acer Group. He was an early champion of outsourcing to India and China at Cadence and Walker. Dr. Liu began his career at IBM where he was responsible for the creation and implementation of SQL and the management of CICS, SNA and AIX, eventually overseeing the worldwide Database and Language lines-of-business. He received his undergraduate degree from Taiwan University and his Ph.D. from Princeton University.