That's not what we expected. Before the recession, interest had been growing among IT outsourcers and longtime customers in forging relationships where both parties share in benefits reaped through working together, but also share in any pitfalls. Outsourcers looked for "partnerships." To do this, they needed to shift to "higher-level" deals that didn't focus solely on cost cutting--including offshore labor arbitrage--but on strategic measures such as revenue growth and customer satisfaction.
Risk-reward IT outsourcing contracts, where service provider fees are tied to business outcomes, have been viewed as the next tier of maturity for the outsourcing industry. But the slowing economy has dampened interest in the model, and getting to that tier is going to take longer.
