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Indian IT has come of age

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CIOL Bureau
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With an aim to encourage usage of genuine software within India, Business

Software Alliance (BSA) has teamed up with India's premier software body Nasscom

to provide Certificate of Recognition Program (CoRP) for Nasscom members in this

region. Zia Askari of DQ Channels spoke with Ajay Advani, Chair,

India Committee 2006, BSA member representative, about this program and its

likely impact on the piracy levels in this region.









What is the procedure for companies to achieve this certification? What are
the benefits that a company can achieve after becoming CoRP certified?




CoRP is a limited period program, valid only for one year. There are multiple
steps that are involved in this certification. First, of all I would like to

stress upon the fact that this is not an enforcement program, so we are looking

at companies consciously participating in this program.






If a company goes for this certification, first it needs to go for a self
declaration, after this we would conduct an independent audit of systems from

our associates — security information systems associates, (SISA) Bangalore. We

give CoRP certification after this systems audit. We have already conducted

asset management workshops in different cities and there was good response from

SMB companies specifically.






There are a lot of benefits that we are offering to Nasscom member companies.
Reducing systems costs — backup and recovery systems are easier to maintain when

companies know what software goes where. Besides the regular benefits, we would

be giving certain additional benefits to companies like exclusive IT skill set

training for successful CoRP applicants, management development program with

IIMs and ISB. In addition to this we would also be looking at funding successful

members for international delegations organized by Nasscom.






You are looking forward to companies first identifying a need to go for such
a certification and than actually conduct a self-systems audit. Do you think

that Indian IT has achieved such a maturity that companies will be motivated to

go for this program?




Yes, there is a certain level of maturity that is needed for companies to go for
this kind of certification, but we sincerely feel that that India has shown a

lot of maturity when it comes to following global standards.






Today, most of the IT companies in India do business on global front and this
type of certification would certainly hold respect for them in the international

arena. Though, we have tailored this particular program specifically for India,

countries like Malaysia, UK and South Africa have similar programs.






Companies, like Microsoft or Adobe for instance, already have some programs
that encourage usage of genuine software within India. How will this program be

placed in such a situation? Do you have an arrangement with companies like

Microsoft or Adobe for instance - to provide special discounts for becoming 100

per cent legal?




As mentioned before, this is not an enforcement centric program. So we would not
be focusing towards enforcing the usage of genuine software, however, we feel

that the burgeoning SMB segment of the country is mature enough to go for this

certification.






There are some piracy related initiatives, which are being executed by companies
like Microsoft. There have been some programs where companies like Microsoft,

Autodesk or Symantec have given some promotional price offerings in order to

encourage usage of genuine software. This program is directed towards seeding

usage of legal software as a cultural concept.






This is just a starting and the first phase for us. We are only targeting
Nasscom members as of now. But as we move forward, in the second phase, we would

be looking at non-Nasscom members as well. We have reached out to about 300

members as of now and 100 companies indicated interest. Out of this about 40

companies have registered for this program. We have audited around 1,500

machines so far.






Today, there is still a lot of piracy happening through the localized IT hubs
like Nehru Place in New Delhi or Lamington Road in Mumbai. What are your

expectations from this program? To what extent will this likely curb the piracy

levels?




Unfortunately, India has a lot of pirated software being used. The piracy level
in India is at 72 per cent. It is true that we can easily get pirated software

from places like Nehru Place in Delhi. We are already doing a lot of enforcement

activities with the local authorities to keep a tab on such activities. This

program will be targeted towards the SMB segment.






Since this is not an enforcement driven activity, we expect that a good number
of companies will come forward to register for this program in the near future.

We are already talking about a lot of associated benefits as far as this

initiative is concerned, so overall we are pretty sure that Indian companies

will take this certification in order to be seen as associated with quality and

responsibility.






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