“IT is not going to be a differentiator in business anymore, as more and more organizations have established their IT strategies and it will be ‘business as usual’,” says Nicholas G. Carr, Harvard professor. This fact has been witnessed by many CXOs in the IT services industry, which disappoints many of them as they were unable to convince and rope in new clients. But I would say still it’s a large pool if you know how to throw your net on the right side and fish around.

But, what is seen among most leaders is focusing on the top three strategies that would increase the value of their companies ? focusing on revenue growth by increasing the volume of business, upgrading the management team, and product and service innovation. However well it works in the tough times, there is always a temptation to spend more time focusing on the state of the general economy or industry trends rather than getting to know the key customer's business better.

According to a market sizing and forecasting model titled 'India Market Trends 2009: IT Services Forecast', the Indian IT Services market is anticipated to grow by about 23 percent during 2010. Despite the positive outlook, the market would not see pre-recessionary growth levels until the tail end of the forecast period in 2013. The end users are expected to remain cautious with discretionary spending not picking up until 2011. Moreover, given the shrinking CIO budgets and enormous competition from the bigwigs like Infosys, Wipro, TCS, and HCL, only the truly dedicated teams are going to win.

In this issue we are sharing with you an inspiration story of UST Global, how they managed to be one of the key players in the services market, and envision being one of the $1 billion enterprises. As rightly said, Sajan Pillai, UST Global CEO, knows the trick to separate the wheat from the chaff and act accordingly. In an industry where everyone does the same kind of work and work on the same model, Sajan Pillai knows that what differentiates and will differentiate in future is the way you manage your client.

We set about trying to showcase the 10 most promising IT services companies in the U.S. It was not a popularity contest, so no voting was allowed; it was an effort by our editorial staff with the help of several VCs, corporate executives, and experienced entrepreneurs to showcase 10 private technology companies in the U.S., which we think are most likely to be the game changers.

We also had deep and enlightening discussions with several U.S. based Indian entrepreneurs while producing this issue. The hallmark of all these entrepreneurs is a great passion for their startups and long-term commitment. We wish them all good luck and hope for great success ahead.

Please do share your thoughts with us.

Christo Jacob
Managing Editor
editor@siliconindia.com