Can we be an another silicon valley?
IT for Local development
Why we don’t use Information Technology for development process of our country? Now a day’s majority of Sri Lankans have the feeling of being a developed country in future. We have ability to be a strong nation and we can earn more revenue by the help of Information Technology (IT).
How the IT can use locally and how it affects to country development?
we are living in a developing country but it doesn’t restrict usage of IT for developing process. All know that India is a developing country but now it consider as one of the pioneer IT potential countries in the world.
We can use following kind of ideas for local developing process which are used in developed countries successively.
1. In Transportation there are so many accidents taking place. As a solution we can use IT and automate traffic control systems for roads and railways, and can use advanced AI (Artificial Intelligence) systems to fully utilize our road systems. Government can make arrangements to enable GPS navigation.
2. Current National identity cards are not up to world standards. Government can introduce a new ID with high end technologies like finger prints and eye scanning embedded into a chip.
3. There is a huge gap between customer and producer. we can use IT to reduce that gap. It can be done by setting up online market places facilitated and maintained by government.
4. In Srilanka we don’t have a centralized information system for healthcare. if we maintain such a system, Doctors can access any patient’s data from anywhere in second. Government can cut down costs.
5. Each and every year government spends millions of rupees on elections. Because traditional voting system requires more man power and lots of paper work. So we can introduce electronic voting system which can compute votes in matter of few minutes. By using such IT Solutions government can cut off extra expenditure and minimize election violations.
Is this a Reality?
But someone can argue that how farmers, doctors, or politicians can use IT. currently they might have PCs in their houses. but none of them have the ability to fully utilize a pc. As future software engineers we can design software which are very user friendly and very reliable and can use local language for give interactions to the system.
This will be a reality until work force has the intention of doing this. Government can motivate employees by giving them free training then they can take the first steps to make the transformation process.
IT for International Development
Here we can consider about what great deal of market for IT products in outside countries and what the limitations for implementing it in Sri Lanka are. We can compare us with nearby Indians.
India didn’t have enough man power and capital when they starting the IT development. We know that India was poor country than Sri Lanka in past. But what the Indian government plan to develop IT industry in their country, Especially targeting Bangalore which is called the “silicon valley” of India. That shows us it’s not impossible to develop the IT industry in a country like Sri Lanka too.
According to a NASSCOM-McKinsey report, annual revenue projections for India’s IT industry in 2008 are US $ 87 billion and market openings are emerging across four broad sectors, IT services, software products, IT enabled services, and e-businesses thus creating a number of opportunities for Indian companies. In addition to the export market, all of these segments have a domestic market component as well.
* Software & Services will contribute over 7.5 % of the overall GDP growth of India
* IT Exports will account for 35% of the total exports from India
* Potential for 2.2 million jobs in IT by 2008
* IT industry will attract Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) of U.S. $ 4-5 billion
* Market capitalization of IT shares will be around U.S. $ 225 billion
So why we can’t earn at least 10 $ billions? Sri lanka can gain various opportunities by implementing IT. We know now Indian IT Company also seek for opportunities for starting their company in our country because now their worker salary level has been increased. So why we missed this great opportunity!!!
For stating a company first we need capital. But luckily there are so many foreign IT companies are willing to invest to start IT companies big companies like IBM, Microsoft help for starting a company by giving capital. And also some companies like to start their owned IT companies in here.
So what are the problems for stating a IT company?
One is finding man power. There aren’t enough educated and technical people in Sri Lanka in IT sector. Still we have around 30,000 IT people and universities and private Institutes don’t produce sufficient number of graduates. IT people don’t have to be software engineers they might be good system analysis, managers and so on. First we must change our mind to make Colombo and IT Park and make whole Sri Lanka a “Silicon valley” .
