Dataquest awards Indian IT industry: Riding on the fourth wave

Humming the ‘India Rising’ spirit, this year’s Dataquest aw-ard saw a
mix bag of IT spearheads. Finishing a decade of awards, this was a different
year for this ‘Osars of the IT industry’ (as stated by Sunil Mittal, CMD of
Bharti Enterprises and Chairman of the Dataquest Aw-ards panel). The awards not
only honored exem-plary performa-nces in the soft-ware industry but also awarded
the hardware and manufactu-ring industry as well.

The awards nite began with a film on the fourth wave of IT industry–the
ascent of BPO industry in India. With a high rate of growth pegged at 70
percent, this industry has been catalytic in transforming Indians as global
knowledge workers who can deliver quality work.

The ‘IT man of the year 2003’ award went to Deepak Puri, the man who has
put India on the global hardware manufacturing map by making Moser Baer, world’s
third largest manufa-cturer of optical media that has shown a CAGR of 177
percent in the last five years. The two other awards announced were Lifetime
Achievement Award, conferred upon Dr Vijay Bhat-kar, Chairman, ETH Research Lab
and the Pathbreaker Award, conferred on Prof Ashok Jhunjhunwala of IIT, Madras.
The awards were presented by Sunil Bharti Mittal, himself, a winner of ‘IT Man
of the Year 2002’.

Also presented on the occasion were the ‘Dataquest Top 20’ corporate
awards. Tata Group–Top IT Group; TCS–Top IT Company; HCL Infosystems–Top
PC Vendor; Tech Pacific India–Top IT Distributor; Microsoft In-dia–Top
Packaged SW Vendor; HP India–Top Prin-ter Vendor; Samsung India–Top
Peripherals Vendor; Cisco Systems India–Top Networking Company; HP–Top
Hardware Vendor; Moser Baer–Fastest Growing Com-pany; NIIT–Top Training
Company; Cadence Design Systems–IT Best Employer; GE Caps–BPO Employee
Satisfaction Award.

In the panel discussion, the group comprising of Dr Bhatkar, Prof
Jhunjhunwala, Puri and Kiran Karnik, Presi-dent, NASSCOM, unanimously echoed the
rising sentiments of Indian prowess.

Commenting on the event, Prasanto K Roy, President and Chief Editor (Business
Maga-zines Group), Cyber Media said, " IT is a ti-dal wave that has meant
glo-bal recognition for India, and shaken stock markets, caught the imagination
of school kids. The Dataquest Awards this year has recognized three men who have
broken new ground in anot-her direction. Each has stren-gthened India’s tech
future in a different way, away from that tidal wave."

CyberMedia News Service

New Delhi