India’s IT sector is experiencing an innovation boom

Tech sectors seem to be booming all around the world over the last few years. And, India’s tech sector is no exception to the rule. Over the past years, the IT services industry has grown to be a crown jewel and a key growth catalyst in the country’s success story and economy. 

The tech sector in India has grown to $181 billion in 2018-2019, representing almost 45% share of the country’s total services exports. Moreover, the industry contributed around 7.7% to the country’s GDP. And, data shows that the sector is expected to contribute with a share of almost 10% to the GDP by 2025.

Yet, what are the key elements that drive the escalating growth of the IT industry in India? Let’s take a look at how India’s tech sector has evolved over the last years. 

Image source: https://unsplash.com/photos/9Dt4WutvwDs

Overview of the IT sector 

Data from Statista shows that the market size of the IT sector in India grew from 24 billion dollars in 2017 to 26 billion US dollars in 2018. Mainly thanks to the startup ecosystem that seems to be flourishing these days. At the moment, there are over 500 IT companies running in the country and over 1000 tech startups that are growing rapidly. 

The IT sector in India has not only attracted reputable IT service providers in India such as IBM and HP, but it has also provided a flourishing environment for many tech startups to appear overnight.  Some of the biggest IT Indian-based companies include Wipro or Tata Consultancy Services. 

And, obviously, the more IT companies exist in the country, the bigger employment opportunities are generated by the industry. In fact, in 2017 only, the industry created jobs for almost four million people with direct employment and indirect employment to nearly 10 million people. And, today, Indian IT specialists represent 75% of the global IT industry talent. 

The most popular IT services exported by Indian IT companies include digital technology, consulting, operations services, computer software and hardware, electronics, IoT and security, search engine, cloud computing, and advertising technologies.  

Fintech-a new industry in India 

Fintech is a relatively new industry that is developing in India for the past few years. And, this industry has a major impact on the country’s foreign exchange ecosystem. Thanks to new technologies being developed by the Indian IT specialists, the Forex scene is now driven by modern practices, rapid track solutions and superior levels of customer services. 

For a very long time, the Forex ecosystem in India was unable to be accessed by all individuals as the monopole belonged to nationalized banks, private sector banks, and their intermediaries.  And, obviously, this also resulted in conventional methods of dealing with forex transactions, hidden costs, complex processes, and overcharged fees. 

However, thanks to the rapid development of the IT sector, especially the Fintech scene, it seems that there are now seamless opportunities for traders including more transparency, ease of forex transactions, and credible tech-enabled platforms for trading. We are talking about new smartphone technologies, AI, machine learning, blockchain, and cloud which had a major impact on how Indian traders interact with the Forex market. 

Although the Indian Forex market is still highly regulated and traders must respect a number of conditions to trade legally, many Indians trade in high volumes and prefer to trade with high leverage brokers. And, technology is the key element that opened the gates for this opportunity. 

Freelancing in India on the rise 

It’s no longer a secret that India ranks as the second-largest freelance workforce globally following only the US. The Indian freelance workforce includes over 15 million people working in multiple and various sectors including IT, finance, sales, marketing, content and academic writing and many more others. 

And, as freelancing takes wings in the country, India’s gig economy is going strong. In fact, a 2018 PayPal study pointed out that in the past 12 months, the freelancing workforce has witnessed a 41% growth. Moreover, it is expected that the Indian freelancing market size will grow to whopping $20-30 billion by 2025. 

Web and mobile development, web design, internet research, graphic design, and advertising technologies are the key focus areas for Indian IT freelancers.

Best paid tech jobs 

As India’s IT scene is booming and evolving at a rapid pace, there is a wealth of high paying opportunities for the technical graduates who are part of the industry. According to a study from the jobs site Indeed, in 2019, IT roles have grown consistently over the past 5 years as the sector is developing and so are IT companies based in the country.  Moreover, IT employers are also willing to pay a lot to attract top talent, especially in profiles such as development, analytics, and data. 

Based on the post published to its jobs site, the study pointed out that IT-related jobs have experienced an 8% growth over the past five years in India. And, the median annual salary offered by IT companies accounted for 1.500.000 rupees, which equals approximately $21.000. And, the best paid tech jobs include data warehouse architect, senior technical lead, analytics manager, technical project manager, and lead development, each of those jobs having a salary ranging between 1,000,000 and 2,400,000 Indian rupees. 

However, despite the fact that the IT sector in India provides great employment opportunities, and the fact that the number of highly skilled technical graduates grows at a rate of 7% per year, it seems that there is still a tech talent crunch in the country. 

It seems that there are many profiles from the IT scene that are still experiencing a lack of specialists.  The sector still needs more security analysts, cloud engineers, network analysts, cybersecurity experts, data scientists, and blockchain developers and AI specialists.  

The IT sector in India is now experiencing tremendous growth. And, it is very unlikely for its rapid development to slow down anytime soon. However, the country’s sector still has a lot of room to grow, especially in terms of the number of IT specialists who join the industry. 

Comments are closed.