India's outsourcing billionaires

The West's drive to save money has helped seven individuals in the world, including five indians; make their billions by setting up shop to meet outsourcing needs.
Wipro Chairman Azim Premji, Infosys' N.R. Narayana Murthy, Nandan Nilekani and Senapathy Gopalakrishnan and HCL Technologies' Shiv Nadar are among the world's top outsourcing billionaires named by Forbes magazine.
According to N.R. Narayana Murthy, chief mentor, Infosys Technologies, India should look at the possible recession in the US as an opportunity as domestic IT companies are more cost effective. "The focus on better allocation of money means a greater opportunity for India," he said adding Indian IT companies were reasonably well placed to withstand the shocks."


The list also features two from Taiwan -- Terry Gou, Chairman of the world's largest contract manufacturer Hai, and Barry Lam of Quanta Computer. In March, Forbes had published 'The World's Billionaires' list, which was topped by legendary investor Warren Buffett.
Employment generation by IT and ITES sectors will double to 3.2 million within the next four to five years, feels Nandan M. Nilekani, Co-Chairman, Infosys Technologies. The country's IT export, earlier worth $30 billion would cross $60 billion in the next three years, creating more job opportunities, he added.



Together, the five Indian outsourcing billionaires are estimated to be worth $20.7 billion, with Azim Premji's wealth pegged at $12.7 billion. "There is such a rapid development of capital markets in other countries that even small discrepancies in salary and the cost of labour are significant."
The growing shortage of IT professionals is fast becoming a serious issue in the United States and the business leadership in the country needs to "take the problem by the horns", Wipro CEO and chairman, Azim Premji, said. "America does not have the talent. There's a huge shortage of IT professionals in the US."

"These billionaires have capitalised on the fact that developing nations are growing 2-3 times as quickly as countries like the US, essentially fuelling an offshore outsourcing trend whose expansion appears to have few boundaries," the magazine said in its report.
Shiv Nadar made HCL India's leading hardware company after IBM quit the country. He has ventured into software services, training, networking, BPO and even distribution. Shiv Nadar started Microcomp in 1976, which was later renamed as HCL, with six friends with just Rs 1.75 lakh.

In the Forbes list of 1,125 billionaires, Azim Premji was ranked 60th, while Shiv Nadar with a fortune worth $3.9 billion ranked 277. At 843rd position, Narayana Murthy was worth $1.4 billion, followed by Nandan Nilekani (1,014) and Senapathy Gopalakrishnan (1,062).
One of the founders of Infosys Technologies, S. Gopalakrishnan (Kris to his colleagues) said the company’s move to diversify across geographies had reduced its dependence on the North American markets. "The Indian economy is growing faster than ever before and our view is that rupee will continue to appreciate. But when it appreciates quickly in a short period of time, like it did this earlier year, it's a cause of concern."