Winds of change

There are reports that the high-profile industry association for the software industry, NASSCOM, may work more closely with their hardware counterpart, MAIT Manufacturers Association of Information Technology). There is even a speculation that the two associations may eventually merge to represent the entire industry.

Both the industry segments are facing heavy weather in recent months. The continuing economic slow down in the USA, which is a major market for Indian software exports has been giving anxious moments to the exporting companies. The 11 September terrorist attack on the World Trade Center and Pentagon and the resulting crisis of confidence facing the vast American market has added to the woes of Indian software exporters. Surveys among Indian industrialists reveal that most of them expect the sluggish economic conditions to continue till end-2002.

As the American economy tries to recover from the slump, orders of software services have slowed down. The downward spiral of stockmarkets across the world, the crisis of confidence in the air travel industry etc add to the anxiety of companies around the world. The hardware industry is not free from the impact as the US continues to be the center of the IT technological developments. Any negative impact on IT manufacturers will eventually spill over to the other markets and India is no exception to this trend.

In such a situation, software companies have to look for alternative markets. While Europe and Far East Asia markets appear attractive, it will take some time for Indian companies to pitch their tents there in a big way. The other option is to look inwards and develop the Indian market itself. This is something the software industry has not looked at seriously, barring the computer-training segment. The vast differential between the sizes of the software exports and domestic market is a proof of this.

There are several sectors of the Indian economy that can do with some help from our software experts. The industry will have to develop applications to suit the Indian administrative and business systems. Given the complicated nature of our existing systems, this should actually prove to be a great challenge to our software minds. And if Indian institutions and companies take to computerization in a big way, it will provide a boost to the hardware products.

Right application software should provide a huge opportunity to developers. Take for instance, the chemists. A large number of them are now using computers for billing and managing inventory. Most of these single-shop owners are getting their software tailor made by local engineers.