NEW DELHI: India is all set to move from being the most preferred BPO destination to a knowledge process outsourcing (KPO) destination. According to a paper prepared by the Confederation of Indian Industry (CII), KPO would grow at 46 percent to reach $ 17 billion by 2010. Besides, the study points that the growth of services sector would be eight percent and its contribution to India's GDP would be 51 percent, affirming that India's transition from being a BPO destination to a KPO destination is imminent.

According to the CII paper "India In The New Knowledge Economy", areas with significant potential for KPO include pharmaceuticals, biotechnology, and ICT, besides legal support, intellectual property research and design and development for automotive and aerospace industries. "India stands to gain from its inherent strengths in the healthcare sector, pharmaceutical and biotech sector and ICT sector," its added.

According to the paper, India could emerge as a global KPO hub as the business requires specialized knowledge in respective verticals and the country's large number of engineering and technical institutes are geared to address the manpower demand.

The paper states that by 2012, the healthcare sector could account for seven percent –eight percent of GDP and provide direct and indirect employment to around nine million people. The CII paper states that the sector would require around $ 22 billion-$31 billion in the next 10 years.

The Indian biotechnology sector too is now on an upswing, and is expected to earn $ five billion annual revenue by 2010. The Indian IT sector too could strike it rich in a new breed of high-end knowledge-based outsourcing as global corporations are moving process like data and intellectual property researches to offshore locations and more specifically to India. The CII paper adds that India has a balanced portfolio of IT offerings and the sector is moving up the value chain, aligning itself to the latest technology needs.