Indian IT is on song

Going global and making a mark: TCS centre in Brazil

The Indian IT sector is expected to clock revenues of $50 billion, a growth of 30 per cent, this year; it employs 1.6 million highly skilled professionals and accounts for about 5.2 per cent to India's growing GDP. It has also been estimated that for every job created in the it industry, another five are created in sectors such as transport, hospitality, banking, real estate and others that support, and thrive on, its growth. This is, therfore, an apt moment to reflect on: what's next for Indian it?

Some of the contours of things to follow are already becoming clear. Tier-I Indian it vendors, such as TCS, Wipro, Infosys and Satyam, have emerged as global players, with revenues ranging from $1.5 billion (Rs 6,150 crore) to $4 billion (Rs 16,400 crore), and all of them are poised to become global champs. But the time has come to flesh out the body contained within those contours. For one, Indian it companies need to move further up the value chain and earn a greater portion of their revenues from consulting, rather than from merely executing work outsourced by others; and the industry needs to add muscle to its near-shoring efforts. In other words, it needs to become more like the IBMs, the Accentures and the Capgeminis of this world. It also needs to create branded proprietory software (think: MS Office or MS Vista), though, to be realistic, this will come, if at all, only after a few more years. And large Indian companies must also look at inorganic growth to quickly acquire new competencies that will give them the necessary muscle to compete globally on the same footing as their much larger MNC rivals. It is a sobering thought that no Indian company has ever won a billion-dollar deal-in fact, no Indian company has ever won a deal worth even a quarter of that amount (for one year, from a single client). And till it scales those heights, the terms "it superpower" and "it behemoths" that the media regularly uses to describe the country and the Big Three of Indian it will continue to ring a little hollow.

But given the rate of growth of the sector, the ambitions of India's it czars and rumours of big ticket global acquisitions, there's no reason why the sector cannot scale the heights that currently still seem out of bounds. And while setting its sights higher, the industry can take a bow for achieving its latest milestone.