India’s information technology industry’s software product sector has seen an increase in productivity. It has the potential to significantly boost revenues and exports in the sector, as well as create substantial employment opportunities. The sector’s focus has shifted from devices to software (security, content management, file sharing, etc.) over the past few years.
The software product market has experienced rapid expansion as a result, with a rising maturity curve. Increase in innovations and IP creation in software products and integration with emerging technologies- especially AI and IoT- have led to the emergence of several entrepreneurial opportunities under the Digital India programme. The sector’s inclusive and long-term growth has increased as a result. With the exception of Japan, the software market in India is expanding at the fastest rate in the Asia-Pacific region. The market expanded by approximately 7% over the past few years, reaching an estimated $ 8.2 billion, of which $ 2.7 billion came from exports. It is expected that content workflow and management, collaborative applications and CRM will remain as the major divers of the sector, till 2022. Also, the Indian SaaS (Software as a Service) market is expected to triple by 2020, which will make enterprise software management much more important. India’s SaaS market is expected to reach $3.4 billion by 2022 and is likely to expand quickly as investors continue to invest in successful SaaS businesses. Zoho, Freshwork, Agile and Chargebee have emerged as high growth SaaS companies in India. The development of cost-effective platforms, mature customer service capabilities, and a focus on continuous innovation are all to blame for SaaS companies’ success in India. The National Policy on Software Products (NPSP), which will position India as a Software Product Nation, was approved by the Union Cabinet in March 2019. India’s goal with this policy is to move up the value chain and focus on technology-oriented products and services instead of just services. It also aims to coordinate government programs like Startup India, Make in India, Digital India, and Skill India in order to establish an Indian software products industry that will generate direct and indirect employment for approximately 3.5 million people and will be worth between 70 and 80 billion dollars by 2025. The policy includes four key strategies to increase India’s share of the global software product market in order to encourage the development of a sustainable software product industry that is driven by innovation: Creating a favorable working environment for the software products business ecosystem: Platform with a single window for quickly dealing with import and export, opening and closing software product businesses, and other legal and regulatory issues The type of software products, interconnections, and other economic sectors, such as hardware manufacturing and services, will be used to classify the model HS Code. Indian software companies will be able to deduct any taxes they owe on investments made in indigenous software product R&D. encouraging and incubating startups in Tier II and Tier III towns and cities, thereby encouraging entrepreneurship and innovation Training and development of human resources for IT professionals working in the field/s of emerging technologies Promoting cross-border trade and improving access to the domestic market Integration of Indian software products into the GeM (Government e-Marketplace) portal Solutions for Smart Cities, healthcare, agriculture, e-learning, transportation, and fintech are being developed by Indian startups. Open API implementation will be actively encouraged to encourage incremental innovation.
