JOIN US The Kanara Chamber of Commerce and Industry (KCCI) and National Association of Software and Services Companies (NASSCOM) organised a workshop on 'Leveraging Technology for Business Growth' in Mangalore on Friday.
Inaugurating the programme, IGP (Western Range) Prathap Reddy said that one could not imagine the technology possibilities of today, a decade ago. "We have over 900 million mobile connections and the cell phone industry is the upward trajectory," he said.
MSMEs need to think of the possibilities of using this technology for their growth. Earlier, outsourcing was a big no-no in the government sector. The government used to try to implement technology internally, hence buy equipment and train staff. However, this was a time consuming process.
Today, government has changed its mindset and has become open to outsourcing. The Karnaraka State Police has a very strong IT network. This was developed by the police since 2002. However, even though its advanced, it was time consuming and hectic. This made the department to be open to solutions offered by outsourced companies.
MSMEs too need to change their mindset and be open to outsourcing. NASSCOM is a great facilitator for this as it recognises experts who offer solutions. Collaborations will be a win - win solution for MSMEs as well as IT sectors, he said. NASSCOM Chairperson Kishore Mandyam said that NASSCOM had recently conducted a survey on 'Awareness of Software in Indian Small and Mediums Enterprises (AWSME)'. "We spoke to 1047 companies in India and realised that there is a good potential for software in Indian market. Many companies have even allotted budgets for software.
Hence, we can conclude that Indian companies have reached a point where they can afford software," he said.
His survey also reveals that many people buy software by reading articles on print media, than TV or Social Networking sites. More than 70 per cent of the companies revealed that they have not been contacted by software sales teams.
About 71 per cent of the companies believe that the software will help their company grow, he added. The survey has jotted down recommendations such as the need to communicate benefits, improve new customer identification and acquisition, establish relevance, capacity building, discussing challenges, effectively use local media, excel in support system and reduce barriers to adoption, he said.