This is the title of the mail that I received last week from one of my colleague and mentor at Wilco. The summary of the mail is to explore an option of developing low cost applications (may be at INR 1000) for SME's and use of rural IT talent to develop these simple tools using simple mySQL and VB. This mail definitely sounded very interesting and wanted to put in some efforts to have a closer look into this.
The rural entrepreneurs are enthusiastic to embrace the IT products if they are convinced about the benefits and of course ROI. Now who will help them out in creating such a solution - a new venture? Quick economics shows that it would take not less than INR6000 to create such a product- and how many takers are there for such kind of products at that price? It is very difficult for such a venture to sustain in long run and at the same time these applications needs to be priced lower so that the enthusiasm is converted into business . This is the reason to invite big Indian IT houses to cross subsidize these products and empower the rural entrepreneur with technology.
Typically the kind of applications needed by SMEs are simple work flow applications and may be some billing and inventory monitoring solutions. These can be comfortably designed by any software engineer with 2-3 year experience and these can be developed by any software literate with basic guidance. There is huge talent that is being wasted on bench in all the big IT firms and it would be a good idea for them to use this bench strength to tap this opportunity. Even if not there are engineering graduates and students in every nook and corner of the peninsula (True at least in case of Maharashtra, Andhra Pradesh, Karnataka and Tamil Nadu) - the companies could use them to develop these applications after giving appropriate training - which in turn would also make them employable in future.
In the wake of weakening dollar IT companies are facing severe pressure to maintain the margins. The US Economy and the turmoil in the financial and banking sectors across the globe is only adding to the problem and would make it tough for the IT companies to find new outsourcing assignments. (Please note that BFSI sector forms 40% of the total IT-ITES exports) It is the time for Indian IT companies to check out the opportunities lying inside the nation in parallel. Agreed that they are not as lucrative as the existing ones in terms of margins but they are definitely challenging and moreover it would help them develop the nation overall. Promote the rural entrepreneur help him grow big and get a bigger business from them.
More over it makes sense for the companies to spend money on these kind of opportunities which would lead to an inclusive growth of the nation - if an entrepreneur becomes efficient the whole nation would be benefited, rather than just donating huge chunks to an unknown entity in the name of CSR where you don't even know where the money is reaching to. The government has provided the required conditions for the sector to grow over the last two decades, of course it was done in the larger interest of the nation - but this is time for the sector to pay back to the nation.
The rural entrepreneurs are enthusiastic to embrace the IT products if they are convinced about the benefits and of course ROI. Now who will help them out in creating such a solution - a new venture? Quick economics shows that it would take not less than INR6000 to create such a product- and how many takers are there for such kind of products at that price? It is very difficult for such a venture to sustain in long run and at the same time these applications needs to be priced lower so that the enthusiasm is converted into business . This is the reason to invite big Indian IT houses to cross subsidize these products and empower the rural entrepreneur with technology.
Typically the kind of applications needed by SMEs are simple work flow applications and may be some billing and inventory monitoring solutions. These can be comfortably designed by any software engineer with 2-3 year experience and these can be developed by any software literate with basic guidance. There is huge talent that is being wasted on bench in all the big IT firms and it would be a good idea for them to use this bench strength to tap this opportunity. Even if not there are engineering graduates and students in every nook and corner of the peninsula (True at least in case of Maharashtra, Andhra Pradesh, Karnataka and Tamil Nadu) - the companies could use them to develop these applications after giving appropriate training - which in turn would also make them employable in future.
In the wake of weakening dollar IT companies are facing severe pressure to maintain the margins. The US Economy and the turmoil in the financial and banking sectors across the globe is only adding to the problem and would make it tough for the IT companies to find new outsourcing assignments. (Please note that BFSI sector forms 40% of the total IT-ITES exports) It is the time for Indian IT companies to check out the opportunities lying inside the nation in parallel. Agreed that they are not as lucrative as the existing ones in terms of margins but they are definitely challenging and moreover it would help them develop the nation overall. Promote the rural entrepreneur help him grow big and get a bigger business from them.
More over it makes sense for the companies to spend money on these kind of opportunities which would lead to an inclusive growth of the nation - if an entrepreneur becomes efficient the whole nation would be benefited, rather than just donating huge chunks to an unknown entity in the name of CSR where you don't even know where the money is reaching to. The government has provided the required conditions for the sector to grow over the last two decades, of course it was done in the larger interest of the nation - but this is time for the sector to pay back to the nation.
