Bangalore: The year 2002 has been a good one for Indian software industry as global companies have embarked on doing more business with their Indian counterparts, and slowdown in the world economy has been a blessing for the country for short-term, president of NASSCOM, Kiran Karnik said on January 6.

Karnik told reporters that with companies finding their bottom-line being squeezed, they are looking to cut costs by outsourcing as much as they can, adding India is the prime source for outsourcing.

"We have been getting interest from customers who want to do more, there are also new customers approaching Indian companies having heard the success of other companies in cutting costs by outsourcing to India. That's driving our business," said Karnik, who earlier addressed the Indian Science Congress.

He said the year 2002 has been very good and "we have been seeing signs of substantial pick up in terms of business to us". "Slowdown in the world economy has been a blessing for us, in the short-term," Karnik said.

He indicated that NASSCOM is not planning a revision of the 30 per cent growth projection in software exports for the current financial year. "We are doing well. We are okay with it. We are staying with that number," he said.

Karnik also indicated that the merger of NASSCOM and MAIT is not on the cards." We don't see the necessity for merging the two organisations. We work together on many key issues."

Karnik, however, also did not rule out the possibility of the merger.

Asked about lessons to be learnt from the year that has just gone by, Karnik said the Indian software industry has to be aware of competition in future, especially China, which can move up very fast.

According to him, India is ahead of China in software by three to four years. "We have to make sure that we stay ahead."

And to do that, he stressed India must focus on better branding and better quality and productivity. Karnik also said efforts are being made to upgrade quality of human resources.

Indian government needs to improve efficiency of systems. China scores over India in terms of infrastructure - power, power-back-up and transportation, while bureaucracy and red-tapism are far less in the neighbouring country as well.

PTI