Software Testing sure does present a great opportunity for growth for major Indian IT Service Providers. With 70 percent of the worldwide outsourced testing services coming to India, we could not ask for anything better. However, the question to ask ourselves is if the enterprises are making the right moves at the right speed, in the right direction to capitalize on the opportunity at hand, and maintain our leadership position.

For the past 6 years starting 2004, Indian IT Service Providers have realized a great business opportunity in Independent Testing Services. The opportunity has grown from a small business of US$ 10 Mn to a whopping US$ 9.1 Bn, demonstrating an average CAGR of 47% over the past years. With over 132,000 members employed purely in Independent Testing Services, the line of business is certainly recognized as an important growth segment and contributor in the Indian IT Industry, and certainly a recession proof business to invest in.

The growth of business has created a new set of challenges, and does question a few paradigms on how the business is really run. The question really is on how the new challenges are being addressed by our enterprises.

Product Quality is the main focus. Many customers have learnt and have started to demand their partners to improve product or deliverable quality. By shifting focus to reducing the cost of quality in their operations, customers have clearly given the status of Business Criticality to the Software Testing activities and projects.

Not just functionality. Traditionally, the testing was focused on Functionality of the system. However, increasingly, organizations are focusing on Performance, Reliability, Security, and Usability as important aspects to be demonstrated for the product. In addition, given the requirement to do Integrated Development; issues like compatibility, installation, internationalization have been seen as necessary to test by many organizations today.