Data protection, privacy laws, skilling key for Indian tech to become $1 trillion contributor: business leaders

Accenture India chairperson Rekha Menon, Adobe India’s vice president and managing director Prativa Mohapatra, and Indiaspora founder M R Rangaswamy expressed confidence that the $227-billion Indian IT services and technology industry can raise its level of play to contribute $1 trillion in total revenue to achieve Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s $5 trillion economy target.

Menon said the genesis of Indian IT as a master of the services industry was by leveraging the “sheer volumes” of available talent to meet the need of the hour, but the emergence of product companies out of India gives confidence in taking the country to the global technology scene.

She added that a data protection and privacy law would ensure disruption-free delivery of work out of India.

An urgent focus on skilling employees was another. Thirdly, employing more women in technology jobs would also contribute to the dream, she said.

Menon, who is also chairperson of IT industry body Nasscom, said 36% of the Indian IT industry – which employs 5 million people – are women, but pointed out that the industry should tap the segment more for better results.

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Rangaswamy said Indian companies had competent founders and software developers, but the missing layer was executives at the product management level. He also suggested that tapping into the methods of Silicon Valley by setting up offices in the valley would help companies bridge the talent gap.

Menon said collaboration between teams, across time zones, has become a business necessity in a global business scene. “No organization can work in silos.”

Speaking about emerging opportunities in the Indian tech scene, Adobe’s Mohapatra said the metaverse was a key segment for Indian startups, particularly those in which the replacement of the physical with the virtual can be done seamlessly, such as meetings.

Menon and Rangaswamy spoke about “innovating for the bottom of the pyramid,” in sectors such as education and healthcare.

The movement of Indian-origin chief executives to the United States and other regions such as West Asia for a host of reasons, from wanting to be closer to the customers to taxation issues, is an area of concern, the business leaders said.

The movement is occurring at a time when the balance of power has also shifted from the employers to the employees, with the options of flexibility and work-from-anywhere putting job seekers in a position to choose, they added.