Expert: Russian Government Poorly Supports IT Industry
Experts expect software, networking, and outsourcing to be the main growth engines for world IT markets in 2005, the weekly magazine Profil writes.
Feb 01, 2005
MOSCOW, February 1. (RIA Novosti) - Experts expect software, networking, and outsourcing to be the main growth engines for world IT markets in 2005, the weekly magazine Profil writes.
Alexei Sukharev, the president of Auriga, Russia's first export-oriented software company, who holds a doctorate in physics and mathematics, put the outsourcing gap between Russia and India at 12 to 13 years.
He says this is down to a lack of state support for Russian IT companies. Russia's economic development and trade minister, German Gref, announced tax relief areas would be created for the IT industry as far back as in fall 2001 and promised to come up with a relevant bill by the end of that year.
"This must be the very bill President Vladimir Putin wants to be prepared by this March," says the manager. "But is this really state support?"
The government has earned its first praise, he admitted, now that an IT market concept has been approved at last. A debate Vladimir Putin conducted at the Akademgorodok in Siberia led a decision to create technoparks. However, state support must not be limited to this.
Meanwhile, Western experts say Russia's potential outsourcing performance puts it in second or third place in the world - behind India and the Philippines, but ahead of China.
Officially, Russia trained 226,000 IT specialists in 2004.
"However, there are no candidates for real jobs," Mr. Sukharev says, "We need IT-educated people, not just those with a mathematical background."
Some Indian companies not only specialize in outsourcing, but also export IT education. Mr. Sukharev says one of them trains 25,000 programmers and IT managers in China.
"We must get them involved in the same business in this country. In Russia, we have no professors who can do this," Mr. Sukharev argues, saying that this would never result in permanent inferiority, "We're talking about technology, for example .NET - not the plasticity theory that youhave to know to get an order from Boeing or Airbus."
Alexei Sukharev, the president of Auriga, Russia's first export-oriented software company, who holds a doctorate in physics and mathematics, put the outsourcing gap between Russia and India at 12 to 13 years.
He says this is down to a lack of state support for Russian IT companies. Russia's economic development and trade minister, German Gref, announced tax relief areas would be created for the IT industry as far back as in fall 2001 and promised to come up with a relevant bill by the end of that year.
"This must be the very bill President Vladimir Putin wants to be prepared by this March," says the manager. "But is this really state support?"
The government has earned its first praise, he admitted, now that an IT market concept has been approved at last. A debate Vladimir Putin conducted at the Akademgorodok in Siberia led a decision to create technoparks. However, state support must not be limited to this.
Meanwhile, Western experts say Russia's potential outsourcing performance puts it in second or third place in the world - behind India and the Philippines, but ahead of China.
Officially, Russia trained 226,000 IT specialists in 2004.
"However, there are no candidates for real jobs," Mr. Sukharev says, "We need IT-educated people, not just those with a mathematical background."
Some Indian companies not only specialize in outsourcing, but also export IT education. Mr. Sukharev says one of them trains 25,000 programmers and IT managers in China.
"We must get them involved in the same business in this country. In Russia, we have no professors who can do this," Mr. Sukharev argues, saying that this would never result in permanent inferiority, "We're talking about technology, for example .NET - not the plasticity theory that youhave to know to get an order from Boeing or Airbus."