Krakow Main Square Birdview
MOTIFE Blog

7 countries love Poland nearshoring location

By MOTiFE Insights, 11 January 2018

Back 15 years ago, when Krakow started its transition to become a prime software engineering location in Europe, the idea of establishing a remote software development lab was relatively new. Those corporations that would intend to build a remote R&D location would choose to go to India or to Ireland.

Check out also: Krakow IT Market Report 2024

Times have changed, though and the way companies offshore has changed too. More and more firms decide to choose a location that is, in one way or another, close. This proximity can be related to geographical distance, time zone, cultural, linguistic, geopolitical or even related to past historical connections.

Now it seems Europe has split into two areas: countries that nearshore to Central and Eastern Europe and those that nearshore to Southern Europe. Due to language similarities, firms from France or Spain would often look to locations like Portugal, while DACH countries, Nordic countries or the UK often select Poland or its neighbours.

7 countries that nearshore to Poland

We have identified 7 countries that, in recent years, have showed a particular interest in nearshoring to Poland. No wonder! They are just 1.5–2.5 hours away on a direct flight.

But there are numerous factors beyond physical distance why Poland has become such an interesting nearshoring destination for them.  We’re going to look at some interesting data that help paint the picture of how these 7 countries compare to Poland: what’s similar and what differs.

Cost of doing business

The cost of doing business is, no doubt, the primary reason for why companies want to go to Poland. Let’s be more specific and look into the detailed cost comparison between the countries.

Software developers salaries

To start with, let’s use the data from PayScale to compare the median salary of a Java Developer. The data available at PayScale.com represent the salaries of currently employed programmers as self-reported. It does not, however, represent the salaries that need to be paid to new hires, which, depending on the location, can be as much as 20–30% higher than the median.

We captured the median salary of a Java Developer, except for Norway, where due to insufficient data, we used the salary of a Software Developer.

Median Annual salary of Java Developer
Median annual salary of Java Developer - map

Check out also: 7 Reasons Why You Should Set Up A Subsidiary In Poland Instead Of Outsourcing

Additional employment cost

All European countries include a certain portion of Social Security Contribution that is paid by the employer on top of the employee’s gross salary. While the economist would often talk about the tax wedge, here we’ll only focus on the extra cost that an employer has to pay. All the data comes from the OECD records for 2017.

The country where this extra cost is the lowest is Denmark, while the highest is in its neighbouring Sweden. Poland ranks just 3 points above the average, adding 16.8% on top of the gross salary.

Infographic: Extra cost for employers on top of employment's salary

Corporate tax

The majority of the companies that decide to open a location in Poland operate in a model that doesn’t yield profit margin in Poland. The Polish entity sells its services to the parent entity and issues invoices to cover the cost of operations. For some companies, though, paying corporate tax in Poland appears to be a more attractive option. Out of the 7 countries listed, only Switzerland and Germany have a lower corporate tax than Poland. For companies from Denmark, Netherlands, Norway or Sweden, paying corporate taxes in Poland can be an interesting alternative to paying them back home.

Table: Corporate tax
Map: Corporate tax

Cost of office space

For many IT businesses, office space is the second largest recurring R&D cost after salaries.

We compared the cost of office space in the capital cities of the 7 countries and Krakow. We used data from statista.com with a commercial properties lease cost for A-class buildings.

With its plethora of new office buildings and construction of over 200 000 m2 of A-class office space in the last couple of years, Krakow offers very competitive lease prices. Putting aside locations like London and Zurich where the cost is 4–5 times higher than in Krakow, other locations (except for Copenhagen) are at least twice as expensive.

Map: Office space average price
A-class office space average price

Distance

Airfare from Krakow

Map: Airfare to Krakow Poland

Geopolitical proximity

When looking at the geopolitical distance, almost all the selected countries are members of the European Union and the Schengen Area. This significantly facilitates international cooperation and travel while ensuring stable and unified laws across countries.

All 8 countries, except for the UK, function in the same time zone.

EU Membership
Schengen area membership

Skills

Another area worth looking at is related to people’s skills. Since we’re discussing proximity, let’s first check the linguistic similarity. All the 7+1 countries have a very high English proficiency.

English proficiency

Country

Rank

English
Proficiency Score

Netherlands

1

71,45

Sweden

2

70,40

Denmark

3

69,93

Norway

4

67,77

Germany

9

62,35

Poland

11

62,07

Switzerland

14

60,95

Map: English proficiency levels in EU

Best software developers

Another ranking we would like to share is related to software engineering skills. The data comes from HackerRank.com and is based on a very large number of test responses.

Out of all the 8 countries, Poland took the highest position in the rank. Switzerland placed just after Poland. Other countries have very high scores as well.

Country

Rank

Score

Poland

3

98

Switzerland

4

97,9

Germany

14

84,3

Sweden

25

79,9

Netherlands

26

78,9

United Kingdom

29

77,7

Denmark

34

75,6

Norway

36

74,6

Conclusions

When making a decision about where to establish a nearshore development lab, it is necessary to look beyond the cost of software developer salaries. What counts are also numerous other factors that make a specific place a better fit then others.

With nearshoring gaining popularity, we can expect the trend to continue and having more firms coming to Poland in search for business efficiency. And the more companies that come here, the more influence they will have, sharing their culture and building an even more similar environment in Krakow.

If you are looking for information about setting up your presence in Poland, download our Krakow IT Market Report 2024.

If you are interested in alternatives to outsourcing, contact us at MOTIFE to learn more.

If you are looking for interesting job opportunities in tech companies in Krakow and remote, check out open roles at motife.com/jobs.

Krakow IT Market Report 2024


Explore essential data on Poland's tech landscape.

Need to scale up your engineering capabilities?

Please write your message below

Thanks for contacting us! We will be in touch with you shortly.
Oops! Something went wrong while submitting the form.