Beijing rolls out red carpet for Indian IT giants

The Economic Times Online Beijing rolls out red carpet for Indian IT giants

PTI MONDAY, FEBRUARY 28, 2005 10:35:57 AM

BEIJING: China has extended a red carpet welcome to Indian IT giants like Wipro, Infosys, TCS and Satyam to set up a software development base here that would propel Beijing to become a major global software hub.

"We believe co-operation in software industry between China and India is highly complementary and it is a win-win co-operation," deputy director of high-tech industry development at the National Development and Reform Commission, Xu Qin said at the first India-China Software Summit held here on Sunday.

"We welcome Indian IT heavyweights to set up a base here or build joint ventures with Chinese software companies," vice-director of the capital's Municipal Development and Reform Commission, Zhang Gong said during an ensuring dialogue between Indian and Chinese software industries.

Vice-president of the National buttociation of Software and Services Companies (Nbuttcom) of India, Sunil Mehta lauded the holding of the India-China Software Summit and hoped that the two sides should identify areas of cooperation.

Beijing Software Industry Promotion Centre deputy chief Qu Lingnian said the Chinese capital, which accounted for one-third of the country's IT industry volume and 40 per cent of the country's software exports last year, is one of the ideal choices for Indian software and service firms if they plan to penetrate the booming Chinese market.

Qu is also the chief representative of the Beijing-based Sino-Indian Co-operative Office established last year to woo Indian software majors to the Communist nation, which is also emerging as a compebreastor to India in the IT sector.

Aimed at attracting Indian IT companies to China, especially to Beijing, the office is the only one of its kind and there are no similar arrangements for any other country.

The local government would offer incentives and tax breaks to Indian industries if they set up bases at the Zhongguancun Software Park here, dubbed as 'China's Silicon valley', the vice mayor of the city, Fan Boyuan and other officials said.

Speaking at the summit, the largest-ever initiative by the two sides, the Commercial and Economic Councillor, Indian Embbutty, Vinay Kwatra said information technology, especially the software sector is one of the new areas identified for bilateral cooperation.

He pointed out that India-China trade and economic cooperation has blossomed in the past few years and the bilateral trade figure for 2004 reached a record $13 billion. However, there is a need to diversify the trade basket, Kwatra said.

US research house Gartner's vice-president Jamie Popkin, who spoke at the conference, predicted that India and China will lead the global market in terms of offshore opportunities. He used the phrase "India China Together" to make up an acronym ICT, which is often interpreted as information and communications technology, to highlight the importance of India-China software co-operation to the global ICT industry.