And even as India is the technology hub due to its talent, the centres need to develop more expertise in deeptech artificial intelligence (AI) and quantum computing, and get the talent skilled for employability, a set of panellists spoke on the second day at the Bengaluru Tech Summit 2024.
“The AI patents filed until the beginning of 2023, 60% came from China, 20% from the US and India’s number is 0.25%. And that is an area of work that Indian GCCs have to really invest and amp up the innovation factor,” said Milesh J, vice president, head of strategy & operations at SAP.
“If you look at the AI landscape, until around the end of 2023, about 160 foundational models existed (would be higher today)…Of those, 100-plus would have come from the US, 20-plus from China and then rest of the world. None from India,” Milesh added.
German software giant SAP operates in India through its Indian subsidiary and through SAP Labs India, its second-largest global research and development (R&D) hub employing over 13,000 workforce.
Vijai Kishan, India regional chair at Fidelity Investments, said, “For the longest time, we had a lot of linear growth where we increased headcount and therefore more roles popped up. We are switching that up to say the definition is more about the impact that you bring back to the business and that’s how it has to be counted.”
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And that’s a big shift in terms of thinking from a GCC standpoint that many of us will go through as GCCs. We can’t just keep growing in headcount. That has to change, Kishan says adding that with the working population aging going forward, the workforce will transition into retirement and our ability to handle that is something Indian companies have to watch out closely.At the panel on “Making Bangalore the GCC HQ of the World”, the industry experts discussed that most GCCs in India are no longer cost centres doing backend work and have moved to being differentiated creators driving innovation from here.
Of the over 1,700 GCCs in India contributing around $64.5 billion market share of technology services, Bengaluru alone houses around 875 GCCs, showing a growth of 41% compound annual growth rate (CAGR) in the last five years.
However, “GCCs are trying to innovate out of compulsion at times… And there is a lot of good talent but you will need to do more,” said Pradeep Menon MD & CEO, HSBC Technology India.
Along similar lines, Andrea Zimmerman, SVP & president in India for retail chain Target, said, India based GCCs need to innovate to drive impact.
“The structure in leadership should foster innovation, do we have such global leaders, that needs investments and the ecosystem that needs to be cultivated and can thrive,” she said.
SAP’s Milesh pointed out that the globalisation culture where the headquarters decide the products, solutions gets extended to centres here.
“Time has now come for reverse innovation. Take those products and solutions, test it out in the Indian and emerging markets and feed that innovation back into established developed markets. This is from long term perspective,” Milesh said.
In the short term, Milesh added, GCCs will need to focus on skilling as even though India is homegrown for AI talent base, there is still shortage in certain areas of deeptech AI, quantum computing and others.
