Talent and tools serve software testing

MUMBAI, INDIA: According to a report by Gartner named ‘Market Trends: Application Development, Worldwide, 2008-2013’, the global software testing market equals $13 billion. The global market size of outsourced QA & Testing services is around $6.1 billion and two-third testing staffs will be located in India and other offshore destinations by 2012, the report says.

India being a dominant outsourcing destination in the IT services; this study is encouraging for the local IT sector, particularly for the software testing services providers.

With such strong dominance, one could vouch that the country has strong supply of IT talent to cater to the the market demands. However, that’s not the case as far as the software testing segment is concerned.

According to AV Asvini Kumar, ThinkSoft Global Services Limited's managing director, there is a deficit of capable talent for the software testing industry.

“Only about 12 per cent fresh IT graduates and diploma holders have the required skills and competency to meet the high quality standards for software testing works,” Kumar says, adding, “About 88 percent fresher gets rejected due to lack of required skills and competency. As a result, we mix the available talent with automation and tools to meet demands.”

With a 500-people workforce, the company utilizes a range of automation tools, both proprietary and open source, to meet and support customers-specific software testing requirements.

Some of the licensed tools are HP's Functional testing, Quality Center and Load Runner; and IBM's Rational Test Studio, Rational Team Studio and Rational Team Test. In addition, open source tools include Performance Testing — OpenSTA, Jmeter, SoapUI; Automation — Selenium, Cubic Test; Test Management — RTH Turbo, Testlink, Xstudio; and Defect Management — Bugzila, Mantiz and others.

“The tools help increase efficiency with quality. For instance, with the help of the tools, a team of 100 people will perform a task otherwise done by 150 people,” he comments.

Kumar observes that the education provided by institutes doesn’t fulfill the software testing industry’s need and hence the industry depends on professional finishing schools such as the Hyderabad-based TalentSprint.

Chennai-based ThinkSoft is a global player in providing specialized software testing services to banking, financial and insurance organizations. It’s global presence in the US, UK, Germany, Dubai and Singapore has helped gain 23 top international clients.

“As there’s a deficit of capable skilled talents, we have professionals with over five years of experience from banking and insurance industry along with talented fresh IT graduates, which undergo in-house training programs,” Kumar concludes.