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The Exodus of Tech from Portugal

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Re: The Exodus of Tech from Portugal

#81

Post by pimentel »

anil_mamede wrote: post #71
pimentel wrote: post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's so right. One classic "success" story of the Portuguese web is http://www.adegga.com/ , a social network for wine... :( Other classic success stories are the ubiquitous service-consultancy firms, always recruiting developers for Sharepoint, COBOL, SAP... Every year I hear about some 3 new of these successful firms. You can also see so called "startups" whose "business" consists of organizing dinners of 20 peop…

But Addega is not of technological nature. We cannot call it a technological service just because it's on WWW. On the other hand Outsystems is one rare example of successfull, portuguese technological product.

I never used it, so I cannot comment on the technological nature of Adegga, but I imagine it's as technological as any other social network.

Outsystems seems to be pretty successful, yeah. But it's a software development platform, in which you drag an "if" block from a palette and drop it in a canvas. Most people prefer typing "if".

Re: The Exodus of Tech from Portugal

#82

Post by tluyben2 »

marcocampos wrote: post #73
tluyben2 wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But what does that mean? Portugal is very cheap (compared to mostly everything) unless you live in Lisbon. So don't live in Lisbon. What do you mean?

Most (all?) tech jobs in Portugal are in Lisbon. I know companies in Oporto (Portugal 2nd biggest city) that have problems hiring people because everyone flees to Lisbon when they finish their degree. I tried to move to a smaller city (I'm not a fan of large cities) but there were very few oportunities, mostly PHP positions where you spend all day coding crappy CMS/CRM/ERPs. Sad but true.

Yes, the big companies are. What is that fascination with big (consultancy) companies? The work there usually is like seeing grass grow. And you'll be 'dispatched' to a client. If you want to live in Castelo Branco please mail me, you can start tomorrow :) (and you won't be making boring stuff either)

Re: The Exodus of Tech from Portugal

#83

Post by tluyben2 »

hk_kh wrote: post #68
tluyben2 wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ok, point taken. In my mind I said it a lot more than I actually did :) I love Andalucia and if I could I would live there forever. I will retire/die there. Like said; I'm not trying to insult people, I'm just saying how it is here. And it's rather crazy. If you are on a permanent vacation, it's the best, but I've tried doing serious things and it just doesn't work. My point is that there are bunches of talented peop…

NiNi is a pejorative word used to refer to people that "Ni estudia Ni trabaja" (do not study, do not work). I hope this word just stops being used. As a young person from Spain that have studied and is working (and have been since I was 18), that term used in spanish people is terribly insulting.

You seem to be an angry young person :) But you are working and you have studied; so why do you find this insulting? If you are not working and not studying, what are you doing? Why is it not ok to call the problem by it's name? Again, I don't know about the north, but here there are TONS of jobs, just no one takes them, and this NiNi seems to be an apt description of that. Sure, if you actually cannot find a job and you did everything to try to get one, then it's much different. But if you turn down jobs because 'its a 30 minute drive' or 'the contract is only for 1 year' then you are not really a very cool person right? I think that's what this term refers to?

Re: The Exodus of Tech from Portugal

#84

Post by davidw »

justincormack wrote: post #50
josemariaruiz wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes Davidw, but I can tell you something about quality of life... it doesn't exists if you don't have money :) Salaries in Spain for IT are so absurd: 600~1500 EUR/month in the south. If you are in the 1500EUR/month salary you are a lucky bastard! Spain is going to change in a really bad way in the next one or two decades and no one wants to be there when they can stay at 5 hours of flight in UK (including bus/train…

The real question is why companies are still not able to compete even with these lower costs. Other inefficiencies and being in the wrong markets?

That's the takehome pay - there are pretty high taxes, so the total that the company is paying might be much higher, and the labor market is very rigid: at least in Italy, it's very difficult to fire someone once they have obtained a 'permanent position'. Still though, I think there are opportunities to be had; things like what Fabrizio Capobianco did with Funambol. I can only find stories in Italian that focus more on the Italian aspect of their operations:

http://www.workingcapital.telecomitalia.it/2010/09/i-piedi-i...

Re: The Exodus of Tech from Portugal

#85

Post by marcocampos »

swah wrote: post #79
marcocampos wrote: post #73

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Most (all?) tech jobs in Portugal are in Lisbon. I know companies in Oporto (Portugal 2nd biggest city) that have problems hiring people because everyone flees to Lisbon when they finish their degree. I tried to move to a smaller city (I'm not a fan of large cities) but there were very few oportunities, mostly PHP positions where you spend all day coding crappy CMS/CRM/ERPs. Sad but true.

I thought Lisbon was cheap as well, greatest cups of coffee I had for .50 euro.

Cheap? Yes, if you come from a country like the US, UK, Germany, etc. The problems is that salaries for tech jobs aren't very good compared with said countries.

Re: The Exodus of Tech from Portugal

#86

Post by tluyben2 »

anil_mamede wrote: post #59

98% of Portuguese IT industry are consultancy and solution development. We have very few product and services development. The game industry is almost zero, applications made here are very rare and services are just copycats. We have a lot of public institutions IT back office projects executed by the same big companies. For a programmer who loves programming: what is the motivation in doing back-offices? Well there…

So why not open up shop yourself? There will be even a 'better' time when the EU tanks, but now is a great time to get great people and make new companies. You don't like the way it is now, so, why not start something to do cool stuff. Make original games and apps? Do 50% client jobs (but only in your niche), do 50% your own. Few friends, small office and have fun.

Re: The Exodus of Tech from Portugal

#87

Post by danmaz74 »

josemariaruiz wrote: post #58
tluyben2 wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But the fact that everyone 'hates Endesa'. That wouldn't fly in NL, why does it fly in ES?

Curiously my answer (I don't know if it's THE answer) is that Spanish people do not like conflict. We don't have class actions as in other countries and people are not used to claim for their rights against big companies. I think we still need a bit of this crazy david-vs-goliath mindset I've seen in other countries where people fight big injustices to the death. The Spaniard is too preoccupied about what the other w…

I'm afraid that's not the answer. In Italy a lot of people LOVE conflict, but with call centers there are very similar problems!

Re: The Exodus of Tech from Portugal

#88

Post by anil_mamede »

jc79 wrote: post #77
anil_mamede wrote: post #59

98% of Portuguese IT industry are consultancy and solution development. We have very few product and services development. The game industry is almost zero, applications made here are very rare and services are just copycats. We have a lot of public institutions IT back office projects executed by the same big companies. For a programmer who loves programming: what is the motivation in doing back-offices? Well there…

I could not agree more! This, among other things, is one of the things that puzzles me the most: almost no products. To that I'll add lack of capability to scale. I've worked at a startup here once, and have seen this lack of capability to scale happen in first hand: unfortunatelly, at the time I was to focused on just being the 'technical guy', and did not have any real input to give (mind you I was just an employee…

We are never old to do what we like. We just need to find the right environment. This environment exists but, of course, we must do something in order to find it. Going to conferences, meet the right people and address the issues of portuguese entrepreneuship. Without effort and some positive criticism we won't be able to change the panorama.

Although the scaling issues is due, in some part, to lack of investment (in other words green dollars) we could address it if professionals were willing to work on ideas they don't own. And many are. People are not motivated only by money but also by achievement.

Unfortunately we are transmitting that to do entrepreneuship you need your own idea and not joining someone and improve his idea, helping him to scale and turn it in our idea (and not only his idea). This may be the reason why there are so many ideas which are derivates of what exists is in the market.

Re: The Exodus of Tech from Portugal

#89

Post by danmaz74 »

tluyben2 wrote: post #23
danmaz74 wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"this crazy way people treat clients in the south must come to a complete halt": Care to specify you mean here?

Well if you live in southern EU you have, as an example, Worten and Mediamarkt => they both do electronic 'stuff', games, tvs, washers, etc. They are quite comparable, except Worten is Portugese and Mediamarkt is German. And that difference is a huge gap. The staff is Worten, in all branches I have been, and, when I had enough, my friends have been, is downright shit. We are talking girls with braces talking to their…

I understand now. So, that would be more of a management thing than a people thing, if the workers of Mediamarkt are still Spaniards...

Re: The Exodus of Tech from Portugal

#90

Post by marcocampos »

miguelpais wrote: post #27

I'm one of those about to graduate students from a technical university in Lisbon, and for me, there is no doubt anymore, I'll start to work outside of Portugal. When you look at it from one side, South European countries have everything: they have the food, the weather, good universities, kind and welcoming people (not to say that other countries don't), talent. They have the potential to be the best countries to li…

I've grown so dispassionate about the tech industry in Portugal that I've been thinking about quitting and doing something else (I'm 28 and I always wanted to be a software developer). I can't change countries (my girlfriend's profession doesn't make it easy to change) so I don't have that many options, so it's either put up it with or quit.

My advice is go and don't come back. The industry around here won't value your skills, you will be considered a tech janitor and after a few years you'll lose your passion and become jaded or just conform to the status quo.

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