Karnik urges defence sector to focus on domestic firms

With an aim to make the $6 billion domestic IT industry account for a larger portion of the pie as against the current 25 per cent of the $24 billion IT industry, Nasscom's president Kiran Karnik has urged the Defence sector to look within the country to meet its IT requirements.

Addressing a two-day seminar on 'Emerging Trends in Defence Communications & IT' by the Mahratta Chamber of Commerce, Industry and Agriculture, Karnik said, "The Indian IT industry is known globally for its quality, ability to scale rapidly and deliver on time and this resonates well with the requirements of the Army which is increasingly moving towards computerisation."

He also urged the industry to focus on the domestic market, "Both industry and Defence need to look within."

Indian IT has moved up the value chain from being just a supplier of cheap labour pool to building capabilities in R&D and design.

"The country has capabilities in automobile, materials and with the convergence of IT and these sectors we are seeing huge potential in the engineering services industry besides R&D, embedded systems and chip designing," noted Karnik.

The apex body is in talks with sectors like the automobile, textiles, ministry of science and technology's department of Science Technologies for materials research and to increase the potential of these verticals in India akin to the Banking, Finance Services and Insurance or the telecom sectors.

"After automobiles we see a huge potential in the textiles and materials verticals," said Karnik, adding, "We are in talks with the Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO) as a part of this initiative."

Emphasising on the Army's role to keep abreast with IT as the nature of war has changed, Lt General Aditya Singh said asymmetric warfare was leaving countries more vulnerable as they moved away from the conventional war or nuclear wars.

"These IT threats have become a matter of national security and the Army and government along with industry will have to converge and make a joint effort to integrate various systems, protocols and standards and develop Indian solutions or else will be left vulnerable," he said.