Indian IT firms fail to bag contracts for Beijing Olympics

By siliconindia   |   Thursday, 28 February 2008, 17:12 IST
Printer Print Email Email
Mumbai: Indian software companies seem to have missed a golden opportunity to make it big in Chinese outsourcing market. As the upcoming Olympic Games offer hundreds of million dollars worth of IT business, Indians companies could not bag any considerable business, reported The Economic Times. French IT company Atos Origin is mandated to run all IT infrastructure for the Games to be held in Beijing later this year. Dominated by local companies, it has proven to be a tough market to crack for the likes of Infosys and Satyam. Tata Consultancy Services is the only company with a meaningful presence there. "There is virtually no cost advantage that the Indian companies can provide to the demand in the Chinese market at present. The Olympics was a chance for IT companies to create some kind of market opening in the domestic space and also to showcase their capabilities," says Siddharth Pai, partner at global advisory firm TPI. TCS is among the few that has managed to strike deals like the Bank of China or China Foreign Exchange Trade System deals. "Compared to the U.S. or the UK, the Chinese market is a very tough nut to crack," admits Girija Pande, executive vice president and regional director-Asia Pacific for TCS. The Mumbai based IT company has a joint venture with the Chinese government and Microsoft for its operations in China. "In addition to the language barrier, Indian companies need to have better delivery centers, you cannot cater to China with your strengths based out of India," Pande said. However, a handful of companies are tasting initial success in the Far Eastern country, but many are still trying to find their feet in the market.