The Hindu : Business : ‘Look homeward to tap software product business’

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Tuesday, Aug 12, 2008
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Business

‘Look homeward to tap software product business’

Anand Parthasarathy

Industry should aim for $9.5-12 billion business by 2015

— PHOTO: G. R. N. SOMASHEKAR

NATIVE POTENTIAL: Som Mittal (left), President, Nasscom, and Ganesh Natarajan, Chairman, at the Nasscom product conclave and expo 2008 in Bangalore on Monday.

BANGALORE: Sharply expanding the software product development business almost ten-fold from today’s revenues of $1.4 billion is doable — if the Indian players address the domestic market instead of merely looking at global opportunities. This is the core message from a study carried out for the National Association of Software and Service Companies (Nasscom) by market researchers Zinnov. The report suggests that the industry should aim to achieve product software business of $9.5 billion to $12 billion by 2015. The India-based business is already growing nearly three times faster than the global pace and if it embraces new technologies like Cloud Computing — Web-based solutions —Virtualisation; Open Source Software and Software-oriented architectures, it can scoop up significant chunks of the global opportunity.

Mindset change

However, this will need a mindset change, where players look homeward at the burgeoning national market, suggested Nasscom Chairman Ganesh Natarajan. The Chairman of Nasscom’s Product Forum was more explicit: “Things like product management and product engineering are quite alien to many Indian companies,” he said.

Study highlights

Presenting highlights of the study, Zinnov’s CEO Pari Natarajan pointed at Indian product companies which were role models for the industry: iFlex, a respected name for its FlexCube banking solution; Subex which had created a niche in telecom software and Tally which has become a synonym for accounting software among small and medium Indian companies. The product showcase held along with the study release featured over two dozen Indian companies who had created solutions for the product development business.

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