I get it, it is just business, but the reality is that the world of business is built upon goodwill.
Which is what they did, even if they didn't offer it. They demoted those positions - and gave a clear signal they don't care for those projects.
I don’t think that offer would’ve made much sense, when the goal is to build a full low cost team elsewhere. Why would the high cost employee agree to such a transfer? Who would it benefit?
Obviously, google sees something there — why wouldn’t the employee? If you have built your life around your trade, and the center of the trade moves, maybe you should consider moving. That may be easier than finding a new trade.
The value Google sees in these places is lower cost labor. This is not valuable to the current employees and is not a reason to move there.
Moving away from support networks is one major challenge, however, there is a strong expat community there, not to mention people may have relatives in those places.
To the original point, if google just sees people as fungible cost centers,they will eventually dump their users, too. It will eventually be a Boeing, where employee / employee good will has been eroded, and no one takes pride in their work .
Outsourcing in general comes and goes in waves, and Australia is also certainly on the upswing towards outsourcing at large corporations as well, but it will likely come back the other way once time cost and quality is considered, before a different MBA comes in a few years later and starts the whole process again.
I don't know Bangalore, but Munich (mentioned in the article) may be a cool place to live and the compensation may be in the same ballpark than in the US after taking into account cost of living. It's actually not uncommon to see people working in US offices transferring to Europe. And most employees in Europe don't necessarily want to transfer to the US even though they often could.
Reasons could be interest in a different culture, not adjusting to US culture, better work life balance, better job security.