Low-cost country sourcing (LCCS) is procurement strategy in which a company sources materials from countries with lower labour and production costs in order to cut operating expenses.[citation needed] LCCS falls under a broad category of procurement efforts called global sourcing.
The process of low-cost sourcing consists of two parties. The customer and the supplier countries like US, UK, Canada, Japan, Australia, and West European nations are considered as high-cost countries (HCC) whereas resource rich and regulated wage labor locations like China, India, Indonesia, Bolivia, Brazil, Russia, Mexico, and East European nations are considered low-cost countries (LCC). In low-cost-country sourcing the material (products) flows from LCC to HCC while the technology flows from HCC to LCC.
The primary principle behind LCCS is to obtain sourcing efficiencies through identifying and exploiting opportunities of price reduction between geographies.
Aside from price other reasons for engaging in global sourcing can include improved manufacturing capacity/ time frames, quality of goods, improved customer services and logistics benefits.[1][2]