BANGALORE: Governments must focus on developing infrastructure and human resources or face the prospect of infotech companies migrating, not just out of Bangalore or Karnataka, but also out of India.
This dire warning came from IT leader NR Narayana Murthy while delivering the DV Narasimha Rao memorial lecture on ‘Indian software industry: Opportunities and challenges’ in Mysore on Tuesday.
“Please do not blame IT companies unnecessarily,” the Infosys chief mentor said. “It is easy for IT firms to move out of Bangalore and set up shop anywhere if necessary.”
Murthy said Indian IT companies have 38 per cent of the global market and are growing rapidly. The sector creates up to 3,00,000 jobs annually, more than by any other industry.
Yet India is still only 39th in the world network readiness index. The immediate focus, he suggested, should be to upgrade power supply and airports.
Murthy said IT companies are getting open invitations not just from Maharashtra and Andhra Pradesh but also from South Korea, China, and Europe. “We can move out to other states or to China or to Europe,” he said. “People are eager to invite IT companies outside.”
Criticising the quality of higher education in the country, particularly in engineering, he said almost 75 per cent of the graduates are unemployable. He called for greater autonomy to universities so that they can produce a better workforce.
Murthy said the country would have more than 47 million skilled IT professionals by 2020. While this number would be surplus in India, they could be used in China and Europe.
