Source: pib.nic.in

Finance Minister Shri P. Chidambaram delivered a keynote address on “IT Outsourcing to India” at a Seminar jointly organised by the Norwegian IKT Association and Embassy of India Oslo, Norway last evening. The meeting was attended by prominent IT stakeholders in Norway as well as India. Shri Chidambaram emphasised the unique fundamentals that had gone into making Indian IT industry among the world’s best. He pointed out that Indian IT industry exports crossed US$ 37 billion last year and were likely to reach US$ 80 billion by 2011. The Minister said that the apprehensions about the jobs losses from IT outsourcing were unfounded. To the contrary, more jobs have been created as a result of IT outsourcing. He pointed out that IT outsourcing to India could improve Norwegian industries’ competitivity and their capacity to adopt to the ongoing global trends. India has been Norway’s first source of skilled professionals for past one year.

During the seminar, acquisition of M/s SPAN, a Bangalore-based IT company by M/s EDB Business Partners ASA, Norway’s largest IT company, was announced. Shri Chidambaram personally congratulated the two Managing Directors and wished them further success. This is the largest ever IT acquisition by Norwegian IT company in Asia involving over 500 IT professionals working with SPAN.

In his welcome address IKT Director General Per Morten Hoff welcomed India-Norwegian synergy in IT sector and assured of his Association’s patronage to this trend. Other companies outsourcing to India from Norway such as TCS and Accenture also made their presentations at the seminar.