Egypt makes big strides in IT

MUMBAI, INDIA: Egypt’s Information Technology offerings are fast catching up both in terms of promoting IT awareness in their nation and attracting Indian firms to launch base there.

"We can offer India additional complimentary advantages to help the Indian companies better position themselves to address the additional demand worldwide. What we are doing is trying to attract the Indian companies and set up bases there," said Amin Khairaldin, advisor and board member at the Information Technology Industry Development Agency (ITIDA).

ITIDA, a government body, was formed as an outcome of Egypt's e-signature Law No.15 2004.

The body is chiefly responsible for setting its executive directives, enforcing the law and encouraging the development of the IT industry and increasing exports.

"We want Indian companies to look at Egypt as a second location. We have a lot of similarities with India in terms of culture, time zone, etc” said Khairaldin. Egidio Zarrella, global partner-in-charge, IT advisory at KPMG.

"A lot of the markets in Middle-East and Egypt have started to establish themselves and begun to do well and I am sure that Indian companies would like to explore possibilities in the Egyptian markets and it would be a profitable proposition in the coming years,” he said. 

Khairaldin elucidated that outsourcing was the next big drive for Egyptian IT space.

"When we started to think of this industry of outsourcing, we wanted to have a focused organization to look after that so that there would be no disruptions. The money comes from the industry and they subscribe as a matter of a law and we had a clear mandate to develop the industry."

Thus, Smart Token Project was born, with a mission to build an authentication based on USB that could be utilized by common citizens and the government and achieving a USB-based voucher validation for bringing services such as e-Signature, Internet access, intranets, extranets and virtual private networks.

Khairaldin stressed that international standards were being pursued to maintain the interoperability.

He said that the body is trying to come up with a law on cyber crime in Egypt.

The mission of ITIDA, said Khairaldin, is ‘to grow exports, protect Intellectual Property (IP) and establish, encourage and finance the usage of e-signature."

ITIDA recently took several steps to guard and promote IP Rights in Egypt and to enforce its mandate.

During 2007, Egyptian courts of law issued a number of rulings, some of which carried prison sentences, in cases of IPR infringements.

One of them was concerning IPR infringements that violated the rights of Microsoft and Electronic Arts. The IPR Office in ITIDA conducted an advanced training course that drew the participation of 463 judges representing various courts.

ITIDA is ready to protect people and also bring across awareness of what is available to the users.

Khairaldin shied away when asked about the comparison between Egypt and the Middle East.

"I don't think there is any competition between us and Dubai."

However, he admired India for its might in the IT/ITeS.

“We looked at your model and tried to replicate it." With Indian companies looking at various non-American destinations to grow their base, Egypt with its goodies looks more than just a tourist destination for our IT companies.

(prasadr@cybermedia.co.in)