It’s quite a dismal mood with which we start the new financial year in India. A weak Jan-March quarter for all industry sectors, lackluster performance by the stock market indices in a quarter where most internal bourses recorded dramatic gains and a general feeling that India has lost an opportunity to take an international lead in three years of slowdown! Even as confidence seems to be returning to the US economy, are we as a country positioning ourselves to capitalize on the opportunities of the future?
A two week tour of seven cities across UK and US and meetings with clients in March reinforced the feeling that business confidence remains strong and the likelihood of a second recession has receded in the first few months of this calendar. Tech unemployment is almost non-existent in the US and with both Indian and US firms stepping up their local employment drives, the tightening of visas, expected in an election year seems overdone at a time when corporations are keen to invest in technology. CIOs are discussing new ways of reaching out to customers and optimize supply chains, the kind of discussion we always prefer to cost reduction and “doing more for less”! In fact the jump in apartment rentals in Silicon Valley suggests that innovation is alive and kicking, and this is borne out by the slew of new launches including new apps like Highlight and Glancee that use GPS to let people know about the proximity of friends or even strangers who share similar interests being in the vicinity and enabling networking to reach new levels.
There is enough hope globally that new technology capabilities in cloud, social media and mobility will push CIOs particularly in B2C sectors to accelerate their spending on enterprise social media and mobility. And the voices being picked up by our sales teams across the globe also show a new pull for better offshore services with robust business inflows happening, not just in the West but also Australia Asia, Middle East and Africa. Big ticket projects may be put under the microscope particularly in the still sluggish Financial Services and Retail segments, and this coupled with the lower growth projections of NASSCOM and some of the larger Indian and multinational providers have led some analysts to point to a slowdown for the IT sector this year. I am sure this will be proved wrong as the year progresses. So why this Kolaveri anyway? The Government in India seems to be recovering from the near paralysis it displayed towards the end of 2011 and there is hope that many of the bills that were unable to find their way through Parliament will get passed this year and we will see FDI, infrastructure investments and the much needed policy finalization for skills and education happen soon!
For the industry at large, there is a lot at stake if the GDP growth rates can be pushed up a couple of percentage points during this year. A virtuous cycle of growth, increasing demand, more job creation and wide spread prosperity can bring confidence back to consumers and investors and industry associations like CII will need to work hand in hand with Government to ensure that there are no roadblocks. For the IT sector, dependent as it is on exports to cross the hundred billion dollar mark overall and set course for two hundred billion dollars in exports by 2020, Government can do its part by providing more incentives for small towns to join the IT services party and special facilities and tax breaks for the product development fraternity . Industry doyen Narayana Murthy has rightly said that there will be a Bill Gates from India soon, because the youth of the country is ready and willing to choose the road less traveled and embrace innovation in their new entrepreneurial endeavours.
Finally some thoughts on the imperatives for entrepreneurship. At the biannual case study presentation on Zensar that is done at the Harvard Business School, I had the opportunity to interact with many young members of the Class of 2012 and understand their aspirations after an outstanding education and previous experience in consulting and technology majors. There is a desire to make a mark either with smaller global firms or through their own entrepreneurial ventures. There is also a confidence among both American and international students seeking to build entrepreneurial ventures in the tech industry that the eco-system support exists to give them a fair chance of success in their ventures. This is what needs to be strengthened in our country. Product development start-ups in the IT industry and indeed any innovative start-up across industry sectors will need to get the support in our country through enabling Government policies, association and venture capital support and the continued availability of high quality talent. This may be the year to ensure that all this happens!
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This Article was published on the April of The Financial Express
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