The Hindu Business Line : ‘Standardising software will expand user base’

Will save costs
For every PC, if a buyer has to spend about $100 it works out to about $650 m a year.
By not getting locked into proprietary software, we could save about $1.5 billion

V. Rishi Kumar

Hyderabad, Oct. 2

With the country’s PC (personal computer) penetration barely four per cent, industry experts believe that it is time to standardise software formats. This will ensure that the acquisition costs are lower and, thereby, help in expanding the user base.

For every PC sold in the country, about $100 goes into proprietary software. In a cost-sensitive market, where there is a need to significantly populate PCs for mass usage, be it schools, educational institutions and Government, the best way is to address this by standardisation, according to Mr Jaijit Bhattacharya, Country Director, Government Strategy, Sun Microsystems in India.

Speaking to Business Line recently, Mr Bhattacharya, said, “an early decision on standards-based approach for software will bring down the cost and help users access open source products without getting locked up to proprietary software.”

This is a view of representatives of the industry, bodies such as the Computer Society of India and some of the large institutions such as the Indian Institute of Technology, he explained.

Explaining the economics of the PC usage and the implication of software costs on India, Mr Bhattacharya said: “It is estimated that about 6.5 million PCs were sold last year. And for every PC, if a buyer had to spend about $100, it works out to about $650 million per year. An analysis made by us reveals that by not getting locked into proprietary software, we could potentially save as much as $1.5 billion.”

“This is significant and is akin to having enough water near Himalayas that can meet the requirement of the entire country and yet we need bottled mineral water to quench thirst,” he said.

Drawing from the recent debate on standardisation of document format, Mr Bhattacharya welcomed the decision to back open source format as opposed to the one put forth by Microsoft. In a country where there is renewed thrust on developing pilot eGovernance projects and later replicating successful ones, this standardisation process assumes greater significance.

“If you take the case of a project that seeks to digitise land records or registered documents. We need to standardise the entire data capture and retrieval process. Unless this is done, what works in one computer with proprietary software will not work in another,” he explained.

Apart from flexibility that the standards-driven software brings, it has multiplier effect on economy. Instead of a small firm investing about $300 per PC for software, they could save significantly. This is where open document format that ensures compatibility was advantageous, he argued.

Drawing similar analogy, he said “for every DVD player a Chinese manufacturer ships for say $45, about $20 goes in for marketing and for product IP, $20 is for production, it is left with a profit of barely $5.”

“Along with CSI, we have articulated this with the Government and expect a decision that has far-reaching economic impact,” he explained.