Tough Options Ahead

Most US software companies once considered India as

a low-cost programming resource, a perception which has seen a rapid decline. Most MNCs

who set up shop in India go there for quality software development talent and not merely

cheap resources.While there is a lot of noise about why the industry should move up the

value chain, there does not seem to be a clear consensus on what needs to be done to move

up.

And while the debate goes on, most of the

bottomline continues to flow out of professional (body-shopping) services.

Core Competencies



The first logical step that Indian software developers should consider is to establish
where their core companies lie and try to progress in those. It is widely accepted that

Indian software companies have established themselves as:

While the first three areas are strategic

areas for moving up the value chain, the fourth one is merely a proposition to expand your

current capabilities. Ideally, the fourth option should provide for improving the state of

affairs in the first three areas.

Consulting Partners



A good project manager normally looks at the problem at hand and makes sure that the
deliverables are as per the agreed specifications-delivered in time, within budget, and

within the resources available. However, there is hardly any strategic input to the client

in terms of the IT direction, or architecting the IT infrastructure of the client

organization. These inputs today come from the consulting organization who have the ''big

picture'' of the overall information requirements of the client organization. The Indian

software developer is merely told that he has to run a project, with clear boundaries

being defined by the consulting organization. The bigger bucks are mostly cornered by the

consulting organization. Though a few Indian software companies have tried to position

good management talent in this area, in most cases this works more as a client

relationship manager, rather than a client consulting partner. Today''s good project

managers should evolve progressively into tomorrow''s consulting partners. When Indian

software developers evolve into a client partner, the long-term benefits of this

relationship with the client are obvious-increased business and continuous downstream

project flow. However, this would work only when there is a long-term view to the process

and a proper balance of priorities between the client and the software developer

requirements. It is easy to get into the project-pushing mode when one works for a

software developer. However, the risk in this approach is that loss of a client would

tremendously impact the software developer. Indian software developers should try and

adopt this model, given the financial resources that are at their disposal currently and

the long-term benefits of the model.

Training Partners



The low-cost quality training option has not been well framed and sold to the prospective
customers in the West. Most training shops in India merely churn out

programmers/operators, and though there are tall claims about running the world''s largest

training infrastructure, their capability in training quality analysts and functional and

technology specialists is by far suspect. We still hear a lot of horror stories about how

the training shops churn out ERP specialists in a few months. Indian software trainers

have a better reputation in developer training than end-user training.

The task before the training managers of

the software industry is to establish that they can provide enterprise-level training.

This would mean framing an enterprise-level training strategy for the client organization,

and providing training to corporate developers for the complete software

development/implementation/maintenance life-cycle. This requires a consulting mindset in

the trainer, which is not easy to find. Like the earlier recommendation, the benefits of

such a strategy are multifold increased business and continuous training projects (the IT

industry ensures that the tools change every six months or so, and most large

organizations have to deploy new technology in some area or the other). In the absence of

such a strategy, the Indian trainer runs into the problem of getting typecasted. He is

merely treated as a specialist-training provider for one particular area of software

design or development. However, providing such a broad array of training options to the

client organization requires investment on latest technologies/methods, with a potential

threat of not finding returns in some areas.

Indian software training companies should

also try to provide full-fledged residential courses for their overseas client on the

outskirts of Indian software cities. The West, by now, knows that the Indian metros are

terribly congested and crowded. This would be an attractive option for most software

developers in the West, as it would provide a low-cost quality option with an opportunity

to explore a country they have never visited. However, the challenge would be to provide

an acceptable environment in terms of facilities such as telecom, Internet, computing, and

recreational facilities.

Product Development



This is by far the toughest option. The product development option from India has always
sent mixed signals. Indian software developers have not still produced software products

that are worth remembering. While some software developers have attempted, they have had

little success. However, there are many software developers silently cooperating and

developing products for their overseas clients (mostly software developers). The

architecting, definition, and management of this product development process is still not

in Indian hands. They are also quite happy, because the inherent high risks of the process

are also not with them. One of the main reasons for Indian developers shying away from

product development is the lack of customer reach, a large domestic market, and the

prohibitively high cost of software marketing. Though the returns are the highest for the

software developers, who build product software, the present state of the product software

scene in the West is also not very encouraging. There are very few software companies,

which have made it big in recent times. Going by the fate of companies such as Lotus,

Netscape, or Borland, this is a very high-risk area. Most software entrepreneurs will have

to build companies and great products only to reach a threshold level where they are ready

for a takeover by a larger software house.

However, the Internet has changed all that.

It has created a level playing field for small developers, regardless of where they are

located. It has proved to be a great medium for disseminating information at a low cost,

not to mention the benefits of electronic software distribution. The largest software

companies are product software companies. The single largest benefit of product software

development is that a large customer base shares the costs of software development, and

the potential to make a big profit is enormous. While most of the cost elements in the IT

industry have fallen steadily, the cost of software development has constantly been on the

increase. While time-to-market pressures are mounting, building software products is

getting increasingly complex.

The biggest problem in this area is,

however, not the economics. It is the absence of a product development mindset in most

Indian developers. This process requires creation of product champions and architects

rather than mere programmers. The product development process of a successful product goes

beyond the first-few versions. It is not a trivial task to maintain a highly-motivated

software development team, to work on a same product line in the fast-changing world of

software. For example, Alan Cooper, the creator of VisualBasic, or David Litwack, the

creator of PowerBuilder, are gurus in their own right. This would require building not

merely a sense of ownership in the product development team, but true ownership in the

enterprise''s profit. Testing quality product software is getting increasingly complex. The

additional overheads of extensive beta testing, which is today an accepted practice, add

to the product development timescales and costs. Despite all these issues, the Indian

software developer is capable of producing a world-class product. It is just the fact that

he simply does not want to swim against the stream. There are many options in front of an

Indian software developer-and with varying degrees of difficulty. And with the dollars

under their belt, he never would have a better time to do it.

RAVI NATARAJAN



is Group Systems Manager,


AI-Tayer Group Dubai, UAE.