Demand for digitally skilled manpower to rise to 2.7 mn in FY23: NASSCOM

As digital technologies disrupt our industries, capacity building and skill development emerge as core components working towards bridging the current skill gap, said Debjani Ghosh, President, NASSCOM

The demand for digitally skilled professionals will rise to 2.3-2.7 million in fiscal 2023 given the current trajectory. The demand for digital talent is expected to grow at around 35 per cent compound annual growth rate (CAGR) between FY 2019-2023, said the IT-BPM industry trade body National Association of Software and Services Companies (NASSCOM).

At present, the digital talent base in IT-ITeS industry in the country is growing at over 20 per cent and has a base of 2,60,000 in cloud computing, 185,000 in AI & big data analytics, 185,000 in social media and mobile platforms and 170,000 in IoT.

The skills that are being developed in these technologies include development of applications, data management, designing use case platforms for operations and directly working with the technology for applications on a daily-basis.

Demand for digital skills has gone up over the past year. Several organisations are adopting new age technologies to remain relevant. The industry is witnessing rising investments towards skilling initiatives in technologies such as AI, ML, data science, cyber security, cloud and blockchain.

"As digital technologies disrupt our industries, capacity building and skill development emerge as core components working towards bridging the current skill gap. With re-skilling and automation emerging as the future drivers of the industry, we aim to craft a new wave of growth and innovation through a digitally skilled pool of professionals," said Debjani Ghosh, President, NASSCOM. She was in Chennai as part of the annual HR Summit organised by NASSCOM.