Wipro sees huge opportunities in new open source policy

Wipro, India's third largest IT services company on Friday said it was seeing significant opportunities to participate in the Centre's drive to encourage adoption and use of open source software.

Recently, the Union Ministry of Communications and IT have come up with a new policy that has made it mandatory for all government offices across the country to use open source software. The policy released late last said that all government organisations must include a requirement for their software suppliers to consider open-source options when implementing e-governance applications and systems.

"The Government of India's policy on open source adoption is a critical step towards building a digitally empowered society. There is little doubt this initiative will usher in greater efficiency, transparency and reliability in India's technology infrastructure besides creating significant employment opportunities over the medium to long term," T K Kurien, CEO of Wipro, said.

With the rapid increase in the pace of adoption of open source software and methodologies backed by advancements in analytics, cloud computing and the Internet of Things (IoTs) have catapulted 'open source' a core technology asset for enterprises globally.

Wipro has identified open source as a core technology initiative and is investing in building a large cadre of skilled personnel with open source industry veterans and community experts. The company's open source practice offers a range of consulting services to clients, including government agencies, looking to adopt open source in their technology landscape.

These services encompass developing and implementing open source policies and processes, advisory and strategy consulting, roadmap development, integration, community engagement, legacy migration, governance, risk mitigation and support.