Lesson learned: Make your needs extremely explicit.

Security is another concern. Brian Chess, chief scientist and security researcher at Fortify Software Inc. in Palo Alto, Calif., says he's seen code written by offshore providers that could potentially expose customer records.

"If you don't ask [offshore providers] to pay attention to security, they don't think about it," he says. "The code that I look at from a security standpoint is just awful."

Lesson learned: Assume nothing. Detail all security requirements.

For five years, United States Cold Storage Inc. has been building a successful relationship with Cognizant Technology Solutions Corp., a developer based in Teaneck, N.J., that has teams in the U.S. and offshore. It began with a project to connect all of U.S. Cold Storage's warehouses over a WAN using Web programming tools.