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According to Nihon Keizai Shimbun, a Japanese daily newspaper, Japanese information technology companies are mapping out a new base to outsource software development in India.
Attracted by low costs in China, Japanese firms had long shifted their software development to China; however, faced with a lack of local engineers there, most Japanese majors are expanding their Indian operations.
By 2009, Fujitsu Ltd. hopes to hire 2,000 engineers locally to develop industrial software for Japanese financial institutions. While, Hitachi Ltd. plans to increase its employee count by 15% for advanced software development.
In a bid to improve quality control, Fujitsu is directly hiring 500-engineers, who are already working on outsourced work at local developers, and providing them with thorough training. As well, it plans to hire 1,500 more engineers by March 2010 for its own development projects at the Indian operations of Rapidigm, a US company Fujitsu acquired in February.
The Japanese electronics major is expected to increase its overseas employees by 2.5% i.e. 5,000 people in India, China and the South-East Asian region. Not to be left behind, Hitachi intends to up its engineering staff count from 470 to 540 in India for developing middleware programmes by end-March 2007.
Another Japanese firm, NEC Corp. plans to form a team of 400 engineers to develop control software for mobile phones in a joint venture with a local partner, and will make India its second hub for overseas operations.
As the world finds itself without skilled or qualified professionals, India is the only country that can balance the rising demand for skills and low costs. And, if Japan is pulling out of China, the writing on the wall is clear! Though China may aspire for India's lead in the field of IT, it is a dream dying a swift death. Like the rest of world excepting India, China is an aging country, coupled with the fact, though it can rustle up enough numbers for low-skilled manufacturing jobs, when it comes to education and professional skills, it bites the dust, with India sprinting ahead.
No mean feat this, to find Japan finally succumbing to India's high-skilled charms! Not just in the field of IT, but also in the off-shoring of a few manufacturing operations. A trickle bound to turn into a deluge, as it has from even the most diehard opponents of off-shoring / outsourcing. The siren call of money in the coffers is far too difficult for anyone to resist, and Japan is not exception! India has done it, all over again!
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