The event began with Dr. Lakshmi Mohan, Faculty, School of Business, State University of New York giving the keynote address. Drawing from her immense experience on the research of global business trends, she commented on the impact of IT in India and the latest opportunities. She firmly stated that globalization is here to stay and the money was in Implementation & Consulting Services. She concluded on the note that Healthcare, Pharma Contract Research & Manufacturing and Automated Decision Technologies were the key growth areas of the future.

Mr. Amitava Roy – President, Symphony Services spoke on the role of Engineering services driving IT in the future. Dispelling myths surrounding the engineering outsourcing and offshoring he mentioned that competitive pressures in the country had declined margins and profitability thereby necessitating application of new business and delivery models. He also mentioned that India would be a leading market for products and services by 2020. ‘We need to think world-class and de-link the notion of a viable innovation from a client endorsement with breakthrough ideas for end-users. Product Innovation should surprise the customer and not wait for an endorsement’ was his concluding message for the audience.

Mr. Aditya Vikram Jain – Assistant Vice President, Evalueserve spoke about the knowledge process outsourcing as a key driver for the IT Industry. Mr. Vikram said that the future opportunities were in the new areas such as Healthcare / Clinical research, Animation services, Remote Education, Sarbanes Oxley compliance related work. The Growth areas needed a shift towards higher value-added work in all areas. Multi-lingual work, new markets (particularly for IP work) and SMEs are a large potential, yet to be fully tapped. He highlighted that building knowledge and credibility around expertise/knowledge, Delivering highest quality consistently, people management, training and retention, c omplying with standards and regulations were the main challenges in the KPO sector. He concluded by saying that KPO is a step in the right direction making India a knowledge hub in the 21st century

Highlighting the Product development market as another key driver for IT, Mr. Ghana Pendse , Vice President – Persistent Systems said that an iterative development process needed to be followed to suit the product according to the customer’s needs. Highlighting the need to develop a product development culture in organizations he urged them to recognize the efforts of offshore teams in creation of new IP. He also pointed out the need to establish clear IP Protection policies through appropriate contracts & systems and trained people in order to win customer confidence.

Giving his views on Remote Infrastructure Management services, Mr. Muthu Rajashekar , Director – Cognizant Technology solutions spoke about what made the RIM possible from India. He spoke about abundant Network and telecom capacities, state of the art tools for IT management and troubleshooting, emergence and adaptation of process standards that boost confidence levels of customers. Developing vendor’s ability to render Quality Services – globally, Services and practices compliant with industry standards and the ability to add value and customize services and solutions, can strengthen the RIM capability with competitive edge. He spoke on the plausible t hreats coming from IT security concerns & Data thefts. Wrapping up his speech he emphasized that tremendous help towards this industry could come from educational Institutions, Government, Product vendors and the Media.

The highlight of the event was a panel discussion moderated by the Joint Director of SPJIMR, Prof. Sunil Rai. The discussion had the four speakers’ (mentioned above) debate with expert analysts from the industry. The eminent panel comprised of Mr. Baru S Rao – CEO, CapGemini, Ms. Jaya Vaidhyanathan – Partner, Accenture Consulting Services, Mr. Pradeep Udhas – Global Head of Sourcing Advisory for KPMG, Mr. Gaurav Singh, Senior Manager, NASSCOM Research and to provide the entrepreneurial insights, Mr. Ajit S. Nagral – Founder & Chairman, NuGenesis Technologies Corporation, Founder and President, Megaware, Inc.

The discussion, well directed by Prof. Sunil Rai, brought out relevant issues confronted by the IT industry and actions to counter the same.

Ms. Jaya Vaidhyanathan remarked that the absence of innovation arising out of inability of Indian mindset to question efficiency and effectiveness is a major hurdle in achieving success in moving up the value chain. In her opinion the society, educational institutions and corporates have to endeavor to foster spirit of innovation to prepare talent.

Mr. Baru S. Rao suggested that it is better to start from consulting and build systems, in the course of which explore operating processes and plausible problems and subsequently attain refinement. He also emphasized that today customers are sensitive to value and they question the expertise of consultants involved in relation to the domain. The key is to sustain accrued advantage He also highlighted an issue of the dearth of deployable resources in the country.

Mr. Gaurav Singh said that as Indians, there is a wider acceptance across the global IT Community. This recognition is an asset in meeting challenges while addressing newer opportunities. As a representative from Nasscomm, Mr. Gaurav also pointed out that the minimal participation of the government but appropriate support has indeed helped the growth of the Indian IT industry and it can only go up from here on.

Mr. Pradeep Udhas was optimistic that India will be able to sustain its competitive advantage even in the future. He said that in IT, requirements are not clear and so Indians will do better and will maintain the lead. He said that he was bullish about India. He also cautioned that .we cannot leave education to educationists alone and there is need for collaboration with Institutions and building public private partnerships as the way for the future. He also pointed out that there is a lot of potential in educational outsourcing and India had potential to become an educational hub.

Giving the entrepreneurial insight, Mr. Ajith Nagral said that both the industry and academia have to step in for the benefit of IT in the future. There is a need to learn to propel resources to attain upward movement on the value chain, and win customer confidence. He also highlighted that dispute resolution was one problem area and takes inordinate time. This issue needs to be addressed to build customer confidence.

The discussion ended with recommendations from the experts to propel IT in 2010. The panelists were unanimous in stating that the key is to create domain skills and the ability to deliver with the right tools. The emphasis for the future is in the processes and attitude building in the employees. The panelists agreed that there has to be increased corporate participation along with that from regulatory bodies like Nasscomm to address the issue of talent shortage. For India to succeed we need to have Indian Products, and better management of cultural and operational issues, was the common opinion.

The analysts and the experts together with academicians discussed the future that lay for the IT industry in India that the promise rests very largely with Engineering and Infrastructure Services, supported by growth in Product Development and consolidation of success of KPM. All in all an event that brought together the best of the IT discussing what is best for the IT, leaving the audience spell bound and asking for more.