By Sandeep Sekhar, Chairman & Global CEO, C Ahead Digital
Playing a big role in the introduction of innovative technologies and digital transformations, the Indian IT sector has emerged as a major contributor towards the country’s GDP over the last decade. The Indian IT sector is built on robust fundamentals of fierce organic talent that can overcome challenges. And the sector is facing its toughest challenge right now.
While the onset of the pandemic rattled and tore the very fabric of life, business and emotional engagement among human beings the world over, there was one industry/sector that kept everything glued together in these extremely difficult times – and that industry is IT and Digital.
This global crisis afflicted India when its economy was already on a slow down. Almost every sector was hit badly due to the pandemic. Even to get back to its pre-pandemic pace, most businesses will likely go through some fundamental changes. Here technology will play a pivotal role in reimaging the businesses post pandemic. Hotels and airports are investing in contactless technology. New physical-distancing requirements will require numerous businesses to rethink their distancing strategies – in other words digital strategies. As such changes shake up businesses, policy makers and economic planners also have a big role, they need to take this opportunity to consider how to build back a better economy, with healthy products and services, digital transformations having accelerated, noticeably.
In many instances, pre-Covid IT adoption was deemed as an advancement and visionary activity, today IT adoption is a necessity for economic survival. Cash to digital money is a classic example of this postulation on IT adoption. Even though digital money was being actively promoted from demonetisation onwards, the rate of its adoption has gained acceleration only once Covid-19 struck. The emotional readiness to adapt to technology has grown manifold breaking all habitual practices that were hindering the change. Human beings tend to change faster under difficult circumstances than when offered motivation. Unfortunately, it took a pandemic for the world to realise the benefits of IT and going digital.
For businesses to navigate their recovery and growth, every organisation (small or big) must follow a suitable digital transformation journey and opt for applicable digitally advance business strategies like e-commerce, lean tech stack, real time analytics, ERP & CRM implementation, cloud computing, etc. Thus, the IT sector is poised to play a vital role in the growth in country’s GDP. Indian businesses are already embracing technologies, however, one needs to be mindful that IT technologies are only tools within a wider framework of how organisations innovate their existing business models for the post-pandemic era.
This pandemic is a catalyst for the Indian IT sector also. India moved into digital space faster than any other country for its internal consumption. India also being the global backbone for IT has seen extreme surge in IT works for world. The high speed-low cost internet access opened phenomenal opportunities for individuals and companies to quickly re-arrange in new normal to continue providing services via IT backbone from homes. Indian IT industries are expected to massively grow in next five-seven years as the world will adopt, change and upgrade IT to counter such challenges and India has the largest cost-effective skill base to provide services across the world and hence will be the natural choice to provide services globally.
IT implementations are now being deemed mandatory and a survival investment for all. India will bring scale and supply to world resulting in job creation in the space in India. It can also attract global talent to the country. The Indian IT industry is expected to experience double digital growth for years to come and contribution massively to forex and GDP.
Continuing in the same vein, IT implementations will generate massive data which will act as a feeder for better services to individuals and businesses, again giving rise to multifarious profitable business opportunities. Business sectors that kept going & growing despite pandemic due to their IT backbone have also increased investment in IT. The next wave will be massive integration, upgrades and optimisations in this space in years to come by harnessing data for accurate tailor-made service for the end-users. IT sector is all-set to play a huge role in the industries’ revival and increase contribution to the country’s GDP in multiple ways.
