Trends 2016: Digitization, a top priority

By P Krishnakumar

The robust growth of India’s information technology industry is attributed to a multitude of factors including growing middle class, rising disposable income and various government initiatives such as broadband connectivity to villages, rural electrification and e-governance programs. The government’s “Digital India” program aims to reach every citizen’s home and office. To increase technology penetration across the country, however, it’s imperative that we increase our manufacturing capacity and there is an urgent need to take some bold steps.

MAIT (Manufacturers’ Association for Information Technology) is the apex body representing ICT manufacturers, hardware design and other associated service segments of the Indian IT Industry, and MAIT’s charter is to develop a globally competitive Indian IT Industry.  The growing dependence of the state and center on e-governance projects has been paving the way for a vibrant ICT sector in the country.  Digital India will allow devices to think independently and make smart decisions on their own, while connected systems will top the chart of emerging trends in 2016. MAIT believes it represents a very real and practical step forward to connect people, disparate machines and widely dispersed data.

Trends to lookout for in 2016:

e-Governance and Digital India

If we look at the drivers that would have an impact in the coming months, e-governance and digitization are going to be crucial. We believe that development can’t happen without digitization. We can’t achieve the development goals that we aspire for unless we digitize. The realization of government’s “Digital India” vision will also help the country by increasing our GDP. Digital India can play a big role in connecting villages and enabling their development.

e-Commerce

 From a technology point of view, the adoption of the e-Commerce platform across enterprises and consumers will be a big game changer. e-Commerce is changing the way people shop in our country and it is proving to be a compelling channel in any company’s go-to-market strategy. On the consumer side, the large scale adoption of technology by students or next-gen consumers is going to be another big game changer. As technology adoption by government and entrepreneurs increases, it will further accelerate the growth of the IT sector.

Rural Connectivity

The government has been putting efforts to connect the village panchayats and getting various services delivered with the help of rural connectivity.  In this whole gamut, dependence on IT infrastructure will be crucial as it will give the communities a more reliable and quicker way to access outside products, services, information and social linkages. For companies or external providers of products and services, it will improve access to rural communities.

GST - A Game Changer

GST (Goods and Services Tax) would be a bigger shaker because if the government implements GST then the need for all businesses, even the small businesses, to adopt technology will be higher. Automation will make it easier for them to transact with each other throughout the country. This way GST will take this industry to the next level and would provide the much-needed push for electronics and hardware manufacturing in India.

Challenges

The overall challenge from the IT industry’s point of view would be in terms of the pace of technology adoption by small businesses and households. If that doesn’t go as expected then we would need to look for alternatives that will encourage this vertical to grow and invest on IT infrastructure.

(The author, P Krishnakumar, is vice president,  MAIT and vice president, Consumer & SB (CSB) Dell India)