Indian Union Budget 2014-15 boost indigenous manufacturing

 S Mohini Ratna
Editor
VARINDIA

The Union Budget for 2014-15 presented by the Union Government promises growth and development. Indian entrepreneurs can have a sigh of relief with the announcement of Rs.10,000-crore fund which provides equity and soft loans for start-ups. The fund would encourage development of products and innovations in the IT industry. The Government's decision of allocating Rs.7,060 crore for development of 100 smart cities and modernization of satellite towns in the country, industrial clusters will help the ESDM industry achieve great heights by developing technology solutions for these initiatives and boost the confidence of the investor community. It will be pertinent for the government to devise measures which will help in "ease of doing business" with the government. Government to boost domestic production of electronic items and reducing dependence on imports. Rationalisation of Inverted duty structure by exempting 4% special additional duty on laptops and tablets is appreciated by the IT hardware Industry.

It is a fact that technology acts as an enabler that can pave the way for being competitive. Small and medium businesses across all verticals play a critical role in the resurgence of the Indian economy. SMBs face tough challenges in the volatile business environment and global competition. Various innovative solutions leveraging the SMAC (Social Mobile Analytics and Cloud) stack support SMB customers in India in the successful adoption of IT to build a comprehensive marketing strategy and drive higher customer engagement.

With the consumerization of IT and explosion of social media, it is estimated that 2.5 exabytes of new data is being created every day and the volume of new data is doubling every 12 to 18 months. Social media has rapidly emerged as an ideal marketing tool. Companies have to adapt quickly and need to feel secure, as cybercriminals are working in a much organized manner and their network is growing stronger day by day, and they have cost India a whopping Rs.24,630 crore ($4 billion) in 2013 alone as criminals have started using sophisticated means.

Organizations are under increasing pressure to respond to this rapid shift and take advantage of the New Style of IT to transform their operations, improve their competitiveness and enhance customer interactions. As a bonus, budget has provided individual tax-payers a big relief to combat inflation. The Government has provided a huge boost for personal savings by enhancing investment from Rs.1 to Rs.1.5 lakh. Initiatives for boosting the manufacturing industry and enabling a good industry network between states will have a tremendous impact.

With all the positive measures in the Budget for promoting indigenous manufacturing of hardware and software products, it is hoped that India will continue to a be strategic hub for IT MNCs.