IT industry to grow 11-11.5% over next 5 yrs: Tech Mahindra

A majority of IT business will come from digital transformation projects in coming years, says C P Gurnani, Managing Director (MD) and Chief Executive Officer (CEO), Tech Mahindra. In an interview with CNBC-TV18, Gurnani says that he expects the company’s digital enterprise solutions business to rise to 40 percent in the next two years. Currently, Tech Mahindra’s 15 to 18 percent comes from the digital enterprise solutions. Gurnani is confident that the IT industry will achieve 11-11.5 percent compounded annual growth rate (CAGR) over the next five years and will meet the 2020 revenue target of USD 225 billion.Gurnani says that the emerging markets are more innovating in terms of new technology. Constant innovation, Research & Development (R&D) and adapting changes will help growth of the IT sector.Below is the transcript of CP Gurnani’s interview with Prerna Baruah on CNBC-TV18.Q: A target of about USD 225 billion by 2020 - the pace is still on? What do you have to say in terms of meeting that target because we are not revising it at this point in time?A: Again, both Mckinsey and Nasscom have worked very closely and Nasscom as you know is a more collection of data from all its member companies. I think 11-11.5 percent growth over the next five years compounded annual growth rate (CAGR) - it should possible and there is a very high degree of confidence that 2020 targets would be met. You have also heard today that 2025 targets are now USD 350 billion. Q: They also say that rumours of death of the sector are vastly exaggerated. What do you have to say that over the next five years where do you see the IT industry going forward? And we are also talking about disruptive technology. What kind of an impact will this have on the sector?A: My point is very simple. I am sure you guys know that when movies were disrupted, when the whole digital streaming happened, everybody said that theatres are dead. Theatres’ prices are gone up- you get better quality in all these multiplexes, but most of us still enjoy a movie in multiplexes. And it is not here. People said that the travel industry is going to die because everything will go onto the portals, everything will become e-commerce. Travel agents are here to stay and things are. So, my quick answer is that like a travel industry or a movie industry, a retail industry has to constantly innovate. They have shown that both brick and click can co-exist. I think the same way, tech services industry or tech engineering industry or a tech research and development industry has to constantly re-innovate and for us to re-energise, that is in our blood and that is why we are in the business.