India is the most preferred offshoring destination for IT companies across the world. India has proven its capabilities in delivering both on-shore and off-shore services to global clients, emerging technologies now offer an entire new gamut of opportunities for top IT firms in India. As per research reports, US$ 150 billion Indian IT industry’s export revenue to grow at 7-8% and domestic market revenue is projected to grow at 10-11 per cent in 2017-18.

The global sourcing market in India continues to grow at a higher pace compared to the IT-BPM industry. The global IT & ITeS market (excluding hardware) reached US$ 1.2 trillion in 2016-17, while the global sourcing market increased by 1.7 times to reach US$ 173-178 billion. India remained the world’s top sourcing destination in 2016-17 with a share of 55 per cent. Indian IT & ITeS companies have set up over 1,000 global delivery centres in over 200 cities around the world.

More importantly, the industry has led the economic transformation of the country and altered the perception of India in the global economy. India's cost competitiveness in providing IT services, which is approximately 3-4 times cheaper than the US, continues to be the mainstay of its Unique Selling Proposition (USP) in the global sourcing market. However, India is also gaining prominence in terms of intellectual capital with several global IT firms setting up their innovation centres in India. The IT industry has also created significant demand in the Indian education sector, especially for engineering and computer science. The Indian IT and ITeS industry is divided into four major segments – IT services, Business Process Management (BPM), software products and engineering services, and hardware.

The internet industry in India is likely to double to reach US$ 250 billion by 2020, growing to 7.5 per cent of gross domestic product (GDP). The number of internet users in India is expected to reach 730 million by 2020, supported by fast adoption of digital technology, according to a report by National Association of Software and Services Companies (NASSCOM). Indian IT exports are projected to grow at 7-8 per cent in 2017-18, in addition to adding 130,000-150,000 new jobs during the same period.

Digital commerce market in India is set to grow at 30.4 per cent year-on-year to Rs 220,330 crore (US$ 34.11 billion) by December 2017, according to a report by Internet and Mobile Association of India and IMRB Kantar. Digital payments in India rose 55 per cent in volume and 24.2 per cent in value year-on-year in FY 2016-17, stated Mr Ratan Watal, Principal Advisor, Niti Aayog. Employees from 12 Indian start-ups, such as Flipkart, Snapdeal, Makemytrip, Naukri, Ola, and others, have gone on to form 700 start-ups on their own, thus expanding the Indian start-up ecosystem.! India ranks third among global start-up ecosystems with more than 4,200 start-ups##.

Total spending on IT by banking and security firms in India is expected to grow 8.6 per cent year-on-year to US$ 7.8 billion by 2017. The public cloud services market in India is slated to grow 35.9 per cent to reach US$ 1.3 billion according to IT consultancy, Gartner. Increased penetration of internet (including in rural areas) and rapid emergence of e-commerce are the main drivers for continued growth of data centre co-location and hosting market in India. The Indian Healthcare Information Technology (IT) market is valued at US$ 1 billion currently and is expected to grow 1.5 times by 2020^^. India's business to business (B2B) e-commerce market is expected to reach US$ 700 billion by 2020 whereas the business to consumer (B2C) e-commerce market is expected to reach US$ 102 billion by 2020.

Investments/ Developments

Indian IT's core competencies and strengths have attracted significant investments from major countries. Leading Indian IT firms like Infosys, Wipro, TCS and Tech Mahindra, are diversifying their offerings and showcasing leading ideas in block chain, artificial intelligence to clients using innovation hubs, research and development centres, in order to create differentiated offerings.

Government Initiatives

In the Union Budget 2017-18, the Government of India announced the following key proposals:

• The Government of India has allocated Rs 10,000 crore (US$ 1.5 billion) for BharatNet project under which it aims to provide high speed broadband to more than 150,000 gram panchayats by 2017-18.
• Prime Minister of India, Mr Narendra Modi, has launched the Bharat Interface for Money (BHIM) app, an Aadhaar-based mobile payment application that will allow users to make digital payments without having to use a credit or debit card. The app has already reached the mark of 10 million downloads.

Some of the major initiatives taken by the government to promote IT and ITeS sector in India are as follows:

• The Government of India is planning to set wifi facility for around 5.5 lakh villages by March 2019 with an estimated investment of Rs 3,700 crore (US$ 555 million) and the government expects to start broadband services with about 1,000 megabit per second (1 gbps) across 1 lakh gram panchayats by the end of this year.
• All the 400 field offices of the Central Public Works Department (CPWD) have been connected through a special integrated portal. Annual payments worth Rs 20,000 crore (US$ 3 billion) will be done electronically after this digital transformation.
• Mr Ravi Shankar Prasad, Union Minister of Law & Justice and Information Technology, has launched a free Doordarshan DTH channel called DigiShala, which will help people understand the use of unified payments interface (UPI), USSD, aadhaar-enabled payments system, electronic wallets, debit and credit cards, thereby promoting various modes of digital payments.
• The Government of India plans to revamp the United Payment Interface (UPI) and Unstructured Supplementary Service Data (USSD), to make it easier for consumers to transact digitally either with or without an Internet connection with the aim of strengthening its push towards making India a digital economy.
• The Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) will soon release consultation papers ahead of framing regulations and standards for the rollout of fifth-generation (5G) networks and Internet of Things (IoT) in India.
• The Railway Ministry plans to give a digital push to the India Railways by introducing bar-coded tickets, Global Positioning System (GPS) based information systems inside coaches, integration of all facilities dealing with ticketing issues, Wi-Fi facilities at the stations, super-fast long-route train service for unreserved passengers among other developments, which will help to increase the passenger traffic.