India’s strengths in the software market also lie in its pursuit of new opportunities. In fact, two key segments that are expected to open up over the next few years for India are e-commerce and remote processing. Opportunities in e-commerce software solutions are emerging as a major area of growth in the Indian IT software and services industry. A recent study undertaken by The Boston Consulting Group for NASSCOM clearly stated that India can earn revenues of US$9 billion from e-business solutions by 2005.

IT-Enabled Services, or “Remote Processing”, has emerged as the next major driver of the technology services industry. With competitive telecommunication costs, well developed infrastructure and a huge pool of English-speaking and computer-literate graduate manpower, India rates higher than many other countries as a hub for IT-enabled services. Call centers and business process outsourcing is emerging as the next wave of growth in India. The McKinsey study indicated that India will earn $18 billion in revenues through these services and create additional employment of one million jobs. Already companies like GE Caps, British Airways, Swissair, American Express and British Telecom are using Indian companies for these services.

The IT-Enabled Services segment currently employs around 70,000 people and accounts for 10.6 percent of the total IT software and services industry revenues.

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