First, of course, we asked about the specifics of the National Day of Pakistan. Mr. Ali was more than happy to explain about the founding of Pakistan by Quaide- Azam Mohammad Ali Jinnah. He went on to explain a little more by saying: “Quaid means leader, Azam means great, so Great Leader Mohammad Ali Jinnah. He led the Muslims of the subcontinent in their struggle for an independent homeland. So therefore he is the founder of Pakistan.” It was on this day that Muslims of South Asia resolved to carve out an independent Muslim state as marked by the Pakistan Resolution, and their struggle was realized seven years later, on August 14, 1947.
When asked about the IT industry in Pakistan, the Ambassador was able to give quite a few details. The IT industry of Pakistan presents tremendous growth and investment opportunities. The competitive advantage in Pakistan is a large pool of English speaking technical talent, quality certified technology companies and a highly supportive government. Of 1,161 active IT companies in Pakistan, some 110 are certified International Standards Organization (ISO) - one of the highest numbers in the world.
The ambassador pointed out: “It is quite encouraging that out of 400,000 graduates we have 20,000 in IT-related subjects. I believe with the passage of time it is going to be more and more strong.” Over 110,000 IT graduates are employed in the country at various IT companies. With a 15% annual increase in enrollment, several fold increase in higher education spending and planned establishment of nine world class international universities, the supply of quality manpower is projected to grow rapidly in the future. A number of government training and internship programs add to higher education management.
Government Incentives
For those who are interested in doing business in Pakistan, one of the most appealing factors is the way that the country views foreign investors. Mr. Ali said: “We in Pakistan don't differentiate between foreign investor and local investor. It's different from many other countries.” This is not an idle boast, because the Government of Pakistan has allowed 100% equity ownership and 100% repatriation of profits to foreign investors. Major tax incentives, such as tax exemption for companies, have been allowed until 2016. This policy must be working out well for them, because the annual growth of IT exports in Pakistan has averaged 50% over the last four years. IT exports totalled US$1.4 billion in 2007, including sales to multi-national companies, earnings of overseas offices of Pakistani companies, and salaries of non-immigrant IT workers abroad.
Pakistan-Korean Cooperation
It is something of an anomaly that Pakistan and Korea have only established official diplomatic relations in 1983. However, the relations between the two countries have created about US$ 1.5 billion in trade. Ambassador Murad Ali described “the relationship is quite healthy and very friendly.”
An MOU for promotion of mutual cooperation between IT industries of Korea and Pakistan exists as of November, 2003. This has resulted in a lot of IT export from Korea to Pakistan. For instance, one company that has taken advantage of that opportunity is Hyundai Information Technology, a subsidiary of Hyundai Group. It undertook the computerization project of the State Bank of Pakistan, a task worth US$25 million. They have also undertaken some projects of developing ERP systems in the private sector in Pakistan. Another company, Jinyang Industrial Co., Ltd., has been exporting system software like Automatic Weather Systems (AWS) to Pakistan. Feelingk Co., Ltd also exported mobile solutions and messaging infrastructure to Pakistan. Similarly, B2B Internet Inc. provided Web Services Integration service like Xico Ware to Pakistan.
The ambassador pointed out that the level of collaboration is far below the potential. There is a need for greater cooperation. Pakistan is the ideal choice for business process outsourcing. Pakistani IT companies offer services like call centers, medical transcription, telemarketing, software development and animation movies and cartoons. Pakistan is a huge market for WiBro. Korea may like to collaborate with Pakistan in sharing its success in the WiBro technology field.
More Information
Pakistan is emerging as a location of choice for the outsourced software development and IT enabled services such as call centers and medical transcription. Several multi-nationals have located development and support centres there while others outsource work to Pakistani companies.
Services companies in Pakistan have acquired business from leading corporations of the world such as GE, Citi Corp, Bank of America, and Google due to the high quality coupled with lower attrition rates. Companies such as IBM, Bearing Point and Teradata have established their own development centres. TRG, an ITenabled services company has acquired companies with revenue of over US$175 million in the US.
Pakistani companies have acquired financing from Silicon Valley Venture Capital Funds and now the Ministry of IT and Pakistan Software Export Board are also facilitating Venture Capital areas in Pakistan. Some other prominent Pakistani IT companies include Multitek Marketing & Services, OFM Enterprises, Complete Ltd., Ovex Technologies, the Resource World and Tricastmedia.
