(BusinessWeek) Skype Technologies' (EBAY ) brash European founders, Niklas Zennström and Janus Friius, had no product in 2003 when they pitched their business plan to Luxembourg venture fund Mangrove Capital Partners. Their idea was to attack a complacent global telecom industry with an ad-based service that offered free phone calls over the Internet--a plan that 20 venture capital groups already had rejected....
....Mangrove is also betting some of the biggest Net hits will come out of Eastern and Central Europe, where engineering and mathematical skills run deep. "We see Eastern European entrepreneurs as more fervently capitalist than Western Europeans," says Lopez....
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Bill Gates says West not supplying enough IT talent
MOSCOW (Reuters) - A shortage of information technology graduates from Western universities is leading companies to call on developing countries to meet research demand, Microsoft chairman Bill Gates said on Tuesday.
After the break-up of the Soviet Union, Russia's internationally renowned education system became a cheap talent pool for the West. Now dozens of Russian language Web sites offer computer programming jobs in the United States, alongside visa support and language training.
"Worldwide, a lot of the developed countries are not graduating as many IT students as they were in the past, which is kind of ironic as it does mean it does increase the opportunities," Gates said.
Many Western firms have also outsourced data management, software development and other high tech operations to lower cost operators in Asia, where education standards are high in some countries but wages are still comparatively low.
"There is a shortage of IT skills on a worldwide basis. Anybody who can get those skills here now will have a lot of opportunity," Gates said.
After the break-up of the Soviet Union, Russia's internationally renowned education system became a cheap talent pool for the West. Now dozens of Russian language Web sites offer computer programming jobs in the United States, alongside visa support and language training.
"Worldwide, a lot of the developed countries are not graduating as many IT students as they were in the past, which is kind of ironic as it does mean it does increase the opportunities," Gates said.
Many Western firms have also outsourced data management, software development and other high tech operations to lower cost operators in Asia, where education standards are high in some countries but wages are still comparatively low.
"There is a shortage of IT skills on a worldwide basis. Anybody who can get those skills here now will have a lot of opportunity," Gates said.
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