Search the Internet          Tips  Sites: Finance, Investment

Bangalore IT summit to focus on BPO services

Fakir Chand in Bangalore

The global tech slowdown, especially in the US is turning to be a blessing in disguise for the Indian IT industry, pricing pressures and lower growth rates notwithstanding.

Even as global IT companies, including many multinationals head towards India to set shop, or increase their outsourcing from native tech firms, taking advantage of the high skills at lower cost, various state governments, especially in the southern region are vying with each other for a greater share of the multi-billion dollar pie.

Leading the pack is the Karnataka government, headed by its IT-savvy Chief Minister S M Krishna, who is visiting the United States this month-end to woo the Silicon Valley entrepreneurs and venture capitalists for considering Bangalore as their first and favourite destination for investments or outsourcing their IT products and services.

"The chief minister will be making presentations in the US during his ensuing visit to that country on the strengths and advantages of Bangalore, which has been rated as the world's fourth technology hub.

He will also impress upon the prospective companies as well as angel investors the wealth of human talent available in the state and the pro-active policies of the state government for a win-win situation," state IT secretary Vivek Kulkarni told rediff.com in Bangalore on Friday.

In the run-up to Krishna's first official overseas visit since he took over as chief minister of Karnataka nearly three years ago, the state IT department has launched its blitzkrieg for the fifth edition of the Bangalore IT.Com 2002, the international technology summit, to be held in India's knowledge capital from October 28 - November 1, 2002.

With the information technology-enabled services' industry emerging as the next wave of global IT revolution, the five-day Asia's largest information, communications, and technology event will be focussing on the Business Process Oursourcing services.

"We are targeting a larger audience this time, highlighting the emerging sectors within the IT industry such as BPO, e-governance, and banking and finance," newly appointed state IT minister D B Inamdar stated.

In spite of the continuing downturn in the global IT industry, Inamdar claimed that the proposed summit was likely to be a greater event than last year in view of the encouraging response from as many as 15 countries, including the US, the UK, Germany, Japan, Korea, Singapore and Sri Lanka for participation at country and company levels.

"The technology exhibition will have special pavilions to show case IT nations, software, hardware, telecom, networking, IT infrastructure, e-security, and BPO services. They are being organised distinctly for attracting the right audience. It will also have a pavilion for Indian tech states, which are in league for attracting investments and IT firms from the world over," Kulkarni affirmed.

Recognising the potential of the ITES sector, Bangalore IT.Com will have an exclusive pavilion featuring a BPO conference, an inter-active session on skills required for the service industry, and short-term training courses offered by the Institute of Bioinformatics & Applied Biotechnology, which is located in the International Tech Park at Whitefield on the outskirts of the city.

The course participants will get an insight into bi-informatics software, platforms, wet lab experimentation and DNA sequencing.

The event will also feature a conference entitled "IT for the common man" to educate the people on the benefits of e-governance, and enlighten the industry on the potential of B2B opportunities.

Another area of focus will be on the banking, finance and insurance sectors, keeping in view the increasing use of the convergence technologies in their entire gamut of operations and functions.

Last year, the event had about 250 companies participating despite the setback the IT industry suffered on account of the September 11, 2001 events.

Last year, the event had generated a business of around $250 million, against $400 million that was generated in the 2000 event during the height of the IT boom, with about 400 IT firms participating.

"This time, the event will provide an unique opportunity for foreign delegations and IT companies to interact with their peers and do business in the foremost IT destination in the country," Cyberexpo managing director Pradeep Gupta, the event manager of the summit, remarked.

ALSO READ:
More Money Headlines