Indian Cyber security to reach $35 billion and train one mn experts by 2025

The National Association of Software and Services Companies (NASSCOM) and Data Security Council of India (DSCI) has announced that India can aspire to build a cyber security industry of $35 billion by 2025 and generate a skilled workforce of one million to cater to the rise in global demand. 

Building upon prime minister Narendra Modi’s vision of making India the global hub of cyber security products and services, the report defines a roadmap for the next ten years that will grow the cyber security market in India. NASSCOM envisages the Indian IT industry to achieve a size of $350-400 billion by 2025. 

The global cyber security market is expected to reach approximately $190 billion by 2025 from $85 billion today, and will be driven primarily by the increasing digitization wave and smartphone penetration, leading to newer attack surfaces and ever increasing number  and sophistication of cyber threats. With cyber security products constituting a $38 billion in 2015, network security will emerge as the most attractive product segment by size, while security and vulnerability management has the highest growth prospects across various geographic regions. 

India being a primary hub for growing smartphone penetration and digitization it is imperative to build a robust cyber security products and services industry in the country.

Speaking on the launch of the report, R Chandrashekhar, president, NASSCOM said, “For India to become a global cyber security hub, a list of 16 initiatives has been formulated by NASSCOM-DSCI. These initiatives vary in terms of priority and should be pursued within the next five years. Effective program roll-out and strategic vision realization will require disciplined management of the 16 key initiatives suggested by the report. In short, a substantial trajectory change is required by Indian cyber security industry to achieve its growth vision.”

The report identifies managed security service (MSS), security and vulnerability management (SVM) and network security emerge as attractive opportunities globally, with MSS emerging as the most attractive opportunity, with highest growth of (more than 12 per cent) and largest market size of $18 billion.

Talking about the report, Rama Vedashree, CEO, DSCI said, “Cyber security clusters, a recommendation of our report, can be a key enabler for growing the ecosystem rapidly. We believe that this report will act as the blueprint to define the cyber security ecosystem in India and provide direction to both industry and government.”

An evaluation of global cyber security clusters reveals that policy and financing incentives along with opportunities for skill development emerge as pivotal factors. These clusters have contributed immensely to the development of the cyber security industry in the respective countries. 

Clusters are also important to promote the growth of cyber security start-ups, SMEs and large players through numerous funding and financing initiatives, tax breaks, incubators and accelerators and provisions to promote R&D. The growth is supported by the availability of niche cyber security skills in clusters, which are developed through a close collaboration between the industry and academia.

Last year, NASSCOM-DSCI had established the Cyber Security Task Force (CSTF) initiative to give shape to the prime minister’s vision. The CSTF aims at growing the Indian cyber security products and services industry to $35 billion; creating one million cyber security jobs and 1,000 cyber security startups by 2025.