The subject is not important, but writing on it is, unfortunately. There are
so many people I have met in the last few days-from hardware vendors to their
channel partners, from enterprise users to students with a PC at home-and their
question is the same. There is global slowdown, and the stock markets are
crashing. What's going to happen to IT in India?
My response is that there is no need to panic but there is a dire need to be
cautious.
The fact is that the thousands of professionals working in software and
services companies exporting to the US and Europe, have contributed in a big way
to the boom in the Indian market. Similarly, there are many of us who are
exporting garments, handicrafts, and jewelry. These Indians are buying cars,
booking apartments, spending on clothes...Obviously, if their jobs and salaries
are going to be hit, their purchasing power will come down, and the Indian
market will be hit.
There are many more who are selling mobile phones and services, insurance
plans, or working in banks or managing the IT infrastructure set up by Indian
telecom operators, banks, and pharmaceutical companies. They are also buying
cars, booking apartments, spending on clothes...Yes, there have been some sectors
where we have heard of lay-offs, like aviation, but there are many more that are
hiring.
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| Ibrahim ahmad |
Finally, therefore, who will get more impacted?
I very strongly believe that the pressure on the US and European markets will
be immense to cut costs and therefore in the next 3-6 months they will work out
new plans to enhance productivity and generate local employment. In the next 6-9
months they will once again be outsourcing, one of the most successful business
models to run smart businesses. Therefore, after a cautious, optimistic 6-9
months, I am reasonably sure that the Indian software and services exports
companies will be as busy as they have been for these several years.
But we could badly goof up, and then there will be trouble for all of us.
Therefore there is a big responsibility on each one of us to ensure that not
just the middle class Indian, but even lower middle classes and the classes
beneath them grow and develop.
The Government will play a big role here with its reform policies. But IT
companies will have to re-define their rules as well. Everybody has been talking
of greed being a factor for this global collapse, so let me not talk about it,
but IT companies will need to be partners and stake-holders in their customers'
growth. If their customers collapse they will too.