Outsourcing will fetch India $60 B
By agencies   |   Monday, 19 December 2005, 20:30 IST
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NEW DELHI: Software and customer services outsourced to India are forecast to grow 25 percent a year by the end of the decade to $60 billion, according to a report. According to the latest report of NASSCOM and consulting firm McKinsey, co-estimated that outsourced services will earn $110 billion worldwide by 2010. Of which, Indian companies will get more than half of that business. “India has the potential to capture more than 50 percent of this opportunity,” said Noshir Kaka, a partner at McKinsey. NASSCOM, the lobby firm for local software and service companies, said India now gets 65 percent of the global offshore software market and 46 percent in services. According to the report, insurance, retail, banking and travel companies abroad expect major business in outsourced work. Software and services now add about $17 billion to the economy and directly employ 700,000 people. “We can’t take another 1.6 million workers and add them to our cities now. Our cities are at a choking point,” said Jayant Sinha, a partner at the consulting firm. To meet these requirements of technology firms and their employees, India has to create about 10 to 12 “knowledge cities” with housing, office space, good roads and airport. The report also said that the sector could employ about 2.3 million workers by 2010, but projected a shortfall of 500,000 skilled workers unless infrastructure and education is upgraded. Sinha said, “Only 25 percent of technical graduates and 10 to 15 percent of general college graduates are suitable for employment in the offshore IT and BPO industries.”

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