The problem with Indian IT is that they have not moved from backend work to develop something big on their own. With so much manpower why hasnt an Infosys or a Wipro not made an effort to say develop operating systems, anti virus etc?
It is really disappointing that we have not transited to the next level. Companies like microsoft looking for cheap options will obviously find India getting expensive. Indian call center industry has slowed down and been over taken by the phillipines. India has to innovate to stay relevant in the IT sector.
I actually am not too worried about what happens in the IT sector. For India to become a big power, we need world class manufacturing. That is the key. We need those big manufacturers from the west to get their tech and come to india. Then learn from them and adapt it to our own needs.
OS and Antivirus markets are already mature, there is not much scope for further development, since most of the vendors support the current platforms/environments. For example, even if we manage to develop a a new desktop processor, it will be hard for us to sell it, reason being 99% of all desktop systems work on X86-compatible machines, and there will be compatibility issues, which are not so easy to get resolved.
We will have to wait for some time, who knows we will be able to create something which will revolutionize the industry. If we wish to go big, 10% or 20% improvement will not do, we need to achieve 200%.
Our IT companies have changed a lot, they know well that to survive they need to innovate, but under the market constraints.
