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A Mix of Challenges and Opportunities for IT Vendors in India

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Shiwani Prakash

2020 is a year where the coronavirus outbreak is first and foremost a human tragedy, affecting hundreds of thousands of people. Not only this but it is also having a growing impact on the global economy. As the number of deaths and the rising COVID-19 cases continue unabated in the US and Europe, the main revenue generating geographies of Indian IT companies’ experts feel that it could be a mixed bag of challenges and even opportunities for these firms.

According to the International Data Corporation (IDC), growth in global IT Spending is expected to reduce by 3-4 percent by the end of 2020, considering “Pessimistic Scenario” due to the outbreak of Coronavirus disease (COVID-19) pandemic, as per IDC Worldwide Black Book Live Edition, February 2020. As considering the prevailing 'pessimistic scenario' due to the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic, the impact might be even more profound as the spread has engulfed many countries beyond China.

While the major impact is expected to be on the hardware business, the software and services businesses are also expected to slow down as the spread of COVID-19 goes beyond the boundaries of Asia.

Observing the scenario of Indian market Sharath Srinivasamurthy, Research Director, Enterprise Solutions and ICT Practices, IDC India says, “While the actual impact of COVID-19 on India market will be evident by middle of 2020, we expect a slowdown in terms of discretionary IT spending, contract renewals and new deals getting signed as enterprises recalibrate by cost structure in coming months.

Existing project executions have also taken a hit due to travel restrictions in place. IT vendors will be forced to relook at their growth targets for the rest of the year as the impact will become evident in the next few quarters. On the other hand, it has provided an opportunity to IT vendors to test their resilience on business continuity, remote connectivity, and security as they look at innovative ways to service their clients.

Enterprises are looking at IT vendors to handhold them in the hour of crisis.”

Additionally, the IDC findings say that the COVID-19 crisis will provide an opportunity to IT vendors. It will test their resilience on business continuity, remote connectivity, and security as they look at innovative ways to service their clients.

Enterprises are excepting at IT vendors to handhold them in the hour of crisis. Further, experts say that while work from home is not a new concept for Indian corporates, it certainly is a testing time to see the success at this scale. Enterprises are also exploring ways of working together. They leverage conversations, meetings and assets across platforms with employees working remotely from wherever they are located to serve customers better and ensure business continuity.

Also, it is expected that there would be the adoption of collaborative applications growing at a rapid pace after the COVID-19 outbreak.
However, the IDC report observed that as IT organisations take preventive measures by encouraging their workforce to connect from home, they are also facing different challenges such as grappling with securing their data and assets from cyber threats.

“We expect the adoption of a zero-trust policy to increase, in the months ahead, as an increasing number of people connect to work from personal networks. We recommend organisations to keep their VPNs and Firewalls updated with security patches in place,” remarked Srinivasamurthy.

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