Indian IT industry felt little uncertain about Obama’s anti outsourcing stunts during the run up to the polls.  Obama said he would stop outsourcing of jobs to other countries by ending tax brakes to companies. But outsourcing does not necessarily mean IT & BPO services. The largest unemployment in the US is in the Manufacturing sector and not in the Tech space US companies witnessing transformation and integration, the role of the IT industry would become more important.  American industry needs to be competitive not just in America but elsewhere as well.

Over 80% of the BPO’s and call centers in India are regulated by the US companies.  "Outsourcing to India and China is irreversible".  Can America afford to lose billions of dollars they get every year from outsourcing jobs to India?  Will Obama do something that will hit American economy the most during this global meltdown?

No, he will never do that.  Obama knows the importance of Indian outsourcing industry to American economy.

I see more opportunities for us as Obama’s priority is to bring the US economy back on track.  It is a globalized world.  It is no just that Indian companies are  operating in the US  or are getting outsourced jobs.  Many leading Indian companies and professionals have helped transform big US companies.  Outsourcing has rather helped US economy to protect their jobs than lose them by improving their competitiveness  and productivity.  A strong US economy would result in huge opportunities for India.  A strong US would have a cascading effect.

Industry is also apprehensive that the Democratic regime in the US could reduce the visas and the work permits.  However technical resource continues to be in shortage and US needs IT skills and because of the current situation, wherever they are trying to improve efficiencies, they need to offshore. So it is assumed that there wont be significant impact on the visa front.

Obama has called for a 150 billion $ research project that would help America find alternative energy sources like hydrogen, methane and solar power in a decade’s time.  His election manifesto talks highly about promoting education, research & development sector and India can play a positive role in realizing this vision.

As per the Nasscom forecast in June-July, software exports are projected to grow by $9 billion to $50 billion in fiscal 2008-09 from $41 billion in fiscal 2007-08 and $32 billion i fiscal 2006-07.  As per McKinsey report, exports are set to touch $60 billion by fiscal 2009-10 even if the growth rate remains lower 23-25%.  Being an integral part of the delivery chain, we are vulnerable to things that happen the world over.  Though the US market accounts for about 60% of the export revenue of Indian IT bellwethers such as TCS, Infosys, Wipro and Satyam, with the BFSI (banking, financial services and insurance) segment contributing more, other verticals such as manufacturing, retail, transport, utility and so on continue to happen.  In a downturn, discretionary spend on new projects, innovation or upgradation gets affected. The impact, if any will be on the latter.

Leading auto OEMs in US are already losing sales by 40-30%.  If they have to compete with the Japanese and Korean auto majors they need to necessarily get components outsourced from auto hubs like India to stay competitive.  India can also be the design outsourcing partner for US Inc - an opportunity India has not tapped properly so far and US Inc can be competitive by partnering with Indian companies.  This is going to be the next big outsourcing wave.

For customers in US buying is now value driven.  A slow down presents opportunity for clients to re-examine how they are positioned for economic recovery.  By investing now companies can be more competitive and much better equipped to explot the recovery and achieve market share/gains whenever it occurs.