Capability Creativity Maturity

George BRASHNAROV

Vice President, PIN-SME

Chairman, BASSCOM

19 May 2011

Chisinau, Moldova

Country IT Branding Important Players and Activities

Moldova ICT Summit 2011 Empowering Development through Information Technology

Important factors 1/2

1: Globalization 3.0 2: “Demographic” change

Important factors 2/2

3: Mass collaboration & Social networks

Why is a Country Brand important?

The Anholt-GfK Roper Nation Brands Index ( “Places”, © Simon Anholt 2010 ) … The way a country is perceived can make a critical difference to the success of

its business, trade and tourism efforts, as well as its diplomatic and cultural relations with other nations….

The effect of national brand image is plain to see. Countries that are lucky or virtuous enough to have acquired a positive

reputation find that everything they, their companies or citizens wish to do on the global stage is easier: their brand goes before them, opening doors, creating trust and respect, and raising the expectation of quality, competence and integrity.

Places with reputation for being poor, uncultured, backward, dangerous or

corrupt find that everything they or their companies try to achieve outside their own neighborhood is harder, and the burden is always on their side to prove that they don’t conform to the national stereotype.

Why is a Country Brand important?

The Anholt-GfK Roper Nation Brands Index ( “Places”, © Simon Anholt 2010 )

Compare : • The experience of a Swedish and an Iranian manager on the

international job market…

• The struggles of an exporter from Moldova with one from Canada…

• The way consumers from Europe or America will pay more for unknown “Japanese” product than for an identical “Korean“ product…that is probably made in the same Chinese factory

WEF GCR index Rank

(value)

GCR innovation Rank (value)

WEF GITR Rank

(value)

eGov development Rank (value)

E-participation Rank (value)

Albania 88(3,94) 121(2,57) 95(3,27) 85(0.4519) 86(0.1286)

Armenia 98(3,76) 116(2,63) 101(3,20) 110(0.4025) 135(0.0429) Azerbaijan 57(4,29) 61(3,16) 64(3,75) 83(0.4571) 68(0.1714)

BiH 102(3,70) 120(2,59) 110(3,07) 74(0.4698) 135(0.0429)

Georgia 93(3,86) 125(2,51) 93(3,38) 100(0,4248) 127(0,0571)

Macedonia 79(4,02) 97(2,88) 73(3,64) 52(0.5261) 55(0.2143)

Moldova 94(3,86) 129(2,49) n/a 80(0.4611) 58(0.2000)

Montenegro 49(4,36) 45(3,48) 42(4,10) 60(0.5101) 76(0.1571)

Romania 67(4,16) 87(2,94) 59(3,80) 47(0,5479) 64(0,1857)

Serbia 96(3,84) 88(2,93) 84(3,51) 81(0.4585) 135(0.0429)

Ukraine 89(3,90) 63(3,11) 82(3,53) 54(0.5181) 48(0.2571)

Sources:

http://www.worldbank.org/;

http://gcr.weforum.org/gcr2010/ ; http://www.networkedreadiness.com/gitr/;

http://www2.unpan.org/egovkb/global_reports/10report.htm;

How is Moldova positioned compared to other countries from the region?

Why is a Country Brand important?

The Anholt-GfK Roper Nation Brands Index ( “Places”, © Simon Anholt 2010 ) Conclusion : Countries have their brand images which are

critical to their success in the modern global economy Problem : Replacing BRAND with BRANDING Governments having big enough marketing budgets and

hiring the best marketing and branding agencies are just having WRONG expectations to create/alter national image by simple mar-com campaigns

Country Brand Measuring

The Anholt-GfK

Roper Nation Brands Index

Country Competitive Advantages

What to do ?

Whilst governments cannot hope to manipulate the perceptions of millions of people in other countries, there are three important things that they can do about their national reputation:

1. To understand and monitor their international image, in the countries and sectors where it matters most to them.

2. To collaborate imaginatively, effectively and openly with business and civil society and to agree on a national strategy and “story” of who the nation is, where it is going and how it is going to get there.

3. To assure that their country maintains a stream of innovative and eye-catching products, services, policies and initiatives in every sector.

How to do it ?

The concept of three S :

Strategy

Symbolic

Actions Substance

Strategy : knowing who a nation is and where it stands today

Substance : effective execution of that strategy in the form of new economic, legal, political, social, cultural and educational activities

Symbolic actions : particular species that might be innovations, structures, reforms, investments which are especially remarcable, memorable, touching, surprising or dramatic

Examples

• Slovenian Government donating financial aid to their Balkan neighbors in order to prove that Slovenia wasn't part of the Balkans

• Spain legalizing single sex-marriages in order to demonstrate values diametrically opposed to the Franco period

• Estonia declaring internet to be a human right & the eGov success

• Buildings as the Guggenheim Museum in Bilbao or the Sydney Opera House

How about ICT ?

• Companies as Nokia, positioning Finland as the country of the modern telecommunication industry

• Research & Innovation centers – Israel

• Volume and quality of work force – India as cost-effective destination for large IT projects

Where one can “find” the IT brand of a country?

• International surveys and reports

• Fairs, conferences and exhibitions

• International organizations

• Market

How do the Global companies measure Regional IT competitiveness?

“…we saw double-digit growth in university enrollment in countries like China, Brazil and Egypt, and the number of firms with quality endorsements like Carnegie Mellon's CMMI certification and the ISO 27001 data-security certification almost doubled in several emerging markets.”

Source: Source: AT Karney, WASHINGTON (15 March 2007), http://www.atkearney.com;

Share of companies certified to comply with international standards in the CEE region

ISO 9xxx

ITIL

CMM/CM…

TickIT

SAS70

ITMark

Cobit

SPICE

Six Sigma

%

Source:CEE_ITO_Review_201

Fairs and exhibitions

• Participation in selected events relevant to the brand

• Detailed planning and continuous preparation not short campaign just before the fair

• Regular participation of companies and high level government official with common message to the audience

• Realistic expectations and focused efforts to achieve them

Membership in International Organizations and Networks

• Active participation

• Continuous commitment

• Expert qualification of the participants

• Motivate the best to participate in contests and competitions

Market

• Promote good cases of market success in the country

• Inform about the strengths of the market environment

• Support the market competition

• Dominant IT buyers such as Government, Banks and others have to promote open international quality and technology standards instead of creating their own

General Conclusions

• Good planning and coordination among stakeholders is a key for creation/altering of successful nation brand

• Position the country based on real strengths not based on wishes

• Be prepared for long journey…..

Global Services Location Index 2007-2009

Central and Eastern Europe:

New Contenders Climb the Rankings

….The trend from last year continues as the established

service providers in the region—the Czech Republic,

Hungary and Poland — lose ground while emerging

locations move up the rankings (see figure 5).

Bulgaria replaces the Czech Republic as the only country

from the region in the top 10.

Both Bulgaria and Romania see big jumps in their

business environment scores as a result of reforms

carried out to qualify for European Union membership, a

process that was successfully concluded January 1, 2007.

Despite a larger population base, Romania’s relatively

higher average wages put it among the middle of the pack

at 33….

More on

http://www.atkearney.com/shared_res/pdf/GSLI_2007.pdf

Off-shoring & Near-shoring Destination

A Voice for ICT SMEs in EU

Founding members of PIN-SME

The supporters

Mobilize supporters for industry excellence -

direct and indirect incentives and help:

USAID/RCI

national USAID competitiveness projects / CEED / CEED II

GTZ (National, regional – ORF: Western Balkans)

EBRD/BAS & TAM

WB/IFC

National funds, competitiveness initiatives, export promotion

EU programs – ex. EU Operational Program for SME competitiveness (Bulgaria): certification in CMMI, ITMark

Thank you for the attention! George Brashnarov VicePresident, PIN-SME www.pin-sme.eu Chairman, BASSCOM www.basscom.org ESI Center Eastern Europe www.esicenter.eu

Capability Creativity Maturity