Recently, government of India approved the National Policy on Software Products 2019. Read on to know more about the key highlights of the policy…
Recently, the government of India approved the National Policy on Software Products 2019 that aims to promote India’s software product industry, focusing on a 10-fold increase in its share of the global software product market by 2025.
In a big boost to the domestic software products industry, which has a significant presence of technology startups, the National Policy on Software Products envisages the creation of a separate ₹5,000 crore fund and support for creation of Intellectual Property (IP).
Information Technology Minister of India, Ravi Shankar Prasad, said in a tweet that “National Policy on Software Products 2019 as approved by the Cabinet aims to encourage innovation, startups and creation of intellectual property (IP) by developing greater collaboration between government, industry, academia and other stakeholders,”
According to Nasscom, the software products industry is relatively of a smaller size when compared to the IT services segment. The revenues of the India’s software product industry comprise around $7.1 billion, of which $2.3 billion are software product exports. In contrast, IT services’ revenue stood at $86 billion for FY 2018, of which $69 billion was exports.
Key Objectives
With the policy, prepared by the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology (MeitY), the government is looking to create a robust software product ecosystem in India. The Indian government noted that it is aligned with other government initiatives such as StartUp India, Make in India, Digital India and Skill India. It aims to make India a $70 to $80 Billion software products industry by the year 2025.
As part of the policy, the government has said to initially outlay ₹ 1,500 Cr to implement the programmes for software development and research, for over a period of seven years.
The National Policy on Software Products 2019 primarily aims to achieve the following 5 missions
• To promote the creation of a sustainable Indian software product industry driven by intellectual property (IP), leading to a 10-fold increase in India’s share of the Global Software product market by 2025.
• To nurture 10K technology startups in the software product industry, including 1K technology startups in Tier 2 and Tier 3 towns and cities, and generate direct and indirect employment for 3.5 Mn by 2025.
• To create a talent pool for the software product industry through up-skilling of 1 million IT professionals, working with one Lakh school and college students, and generate 10K specialised professionals that can provide leadership.
• To build a cluster-based innovation-driven ecosystem by developing 20 sectoral and strategically located software product development clusters having integrated ICT infrastructure, marketing, incubation, R&D/testbeds and mentoring support.
• In order to evolve and monitor scheme and programmes for the implementation of this policy, the National Software Products Mission will be set up with participation from Government, Academia and Industry.
Apart from the massive fund-of-funds, the government has also announced a programme to boost the research, development, and innovation in the software sector, with a budgetary allocation of ₹500 Cr to help MSMEs and promote IP-driven software product creation.
