Bangalore: Bullish on increased outsourcing by American Information Technology (IT) firms from India, domestic software firms view as "positive" or of "little impact" last week's decision by the United States to reduce H1B visa issued to workers in technology industry to 65,000 from 1.95 lakh.

"It doesn't make a difference for firms whose business model has people largely working offshore," Moksha Technologies Pvt Ltd chairman Pawan Kumar said on October 8.

The cap for H1B visas, which was at 65,000 per year till 1999, went up to 1.15 lakh in 2000 during the technology boom period and subsequently to 1.95 lakh for a period of three years. But with cut in tech spending, only about 80,000 of the 1.95 lakh visas were used last year by technology workers.

With pressure to cut IT costs and improve efficiency, global firms have increased their focus on outsourcing their software development and maintenance to low cost countries, with India emerging as the "hotspot" with proven expertise in providing quality work at competitive prices.

Asserting that H1B visas are largely used by firms onsite and with the trend now focused on outsourcing, Kumar said, "It is a good and positive sign, which will make firms drive business where the technology workers are.

"All the hiring is offshore driven and there are very few people who are being hired for onsite work. In fact, lot of techies are coming back to India. This move does not have any impact," head of human resource (HR) consultancy firm TVA Infotech Gautam Sinha said.

India's software body NASSCOM views "little impact" as the mix of onsite-offshore business has undergone a change, with offshoring already accounting for more than half of the total software and service exports.

"A reduction to 65,000 will have at most a marginal impact on the total revenue of business deals and it is business as usual for Indian IT companies," NASSCOM president Kiran Karnik said last week.

Indian software exports stood at $ 9.6 billion in 2002-03 and a conservative growth of 26 per cent is projected for this fiscal.

Industry officials said the real threat would be on the L1 visa, which allows companies to transfer workers on official work from a foreign office to the US organisation.

"More than the H1B visa, the L1 visas are more flexible and employees cannot leave organisations. Any change in that may have an impact," Kshema Technologies chief of human resources Joseph Louis said.

Industry officials were unanimous that a rebound in US technology spend would make American industry to force their government to repeal the cut and attract foreign workers or "outsource for their benefit".

Kumar said the US should not put cap on visas and should allow market forces to decide and cited that only about 80,000 visas were issued of the 1.95 lakh last year.

PTI