Anshul Jain, CEO, DTZ India
Office
As the real estate sector in the country stands at a critical juncture, the performance of this sector will be largely governed by the following drivers:
Stable performance of IT industry:
IT/ITeS sector, which is one of the principal demand drivers for office space in the country, posted encouraging business results over the 2nd and 3rdquarters of 2011. NASSCOM has predicted a decent 16-18% growth for the Indian IT industry in 2011-12. This can be further corroborated by encouraging financial results from large Indian IT companies. Business performances of major IT players like Infosys, Wipro and TCS have largely been in line with market expectations, with a few of them even surpassing market estimates. Additionally, large international IT companies like Accenture and Cognizant, which have significant operations in the country, also posted robust growth.
While the global cues from US and Europe will bring some caution, recent events negate the whispers in IT corridor about recruitment freeze. The period between July to October 2011 saw over some significant hiring by a few major IT players. While this may be a parallel with industry performance of 2007, the current market scenario is way different from 2008-2009, when hiring saw a massive fall.
With the draft National Policy on Information, communication and Technology, 2011 being unveiled recently, the Telecom and IT Minister Kapil Sibal envisions to take the revenues from this industry up from the current USD 80 bn to USD 300 bn. by 2020. The proposed policy also aims at formulation fiscal and other incentives to attract investments in this sector in Tier I and II cities.
