MAIT to tie up with Sri Lankan counterpart

NEW DELHI: MAIT has announced that it would be signing a Memorandum of Understanding with the Federation of Information Technology Industry, Sri Lanka (FITIS) on Friday in Colombo, Sri Lanka.

The MoU, a significant step from MAIT towards putting the Indian hardware industry on the global map and aimed at fostering business ties between the Indian IT Industry and their Sri Lankan counterpart, will be signed during MAIT's visit to Sri Lanka later this week. A high-powered ten-member MAIT delegation, comprising heads and CEOs of leading Indian IT companies, led by S. Devarajan, President-MAIT, will be visiting Sri Lanka to explore market development and export opportunities.

On the upcoming MoU, Devarajan said, "This is a humble first step towards globalizing MAIT. India is a signatory to the ITA-WTO and there is an increased need for integrating the hardware industry in India with the global business. Sri Lanka, as an emerging market, holds immense business potential for IT manufacturers in India. Some of the IT players in India have already started exporting to Sri Lanka and it will be MAIT's endeavor to grow this significantly."

Apart from business development initiatives, the MoU aims at regular exchange of industry and market information between the two countries, cooperation in organizing & supporting events, facilitating contact with Government & Regulatory bodies and exchange of best business practices.

"We need to strengthen our relationship with our counterpart associations across the globe to explore opportunities in other countries to reach the potential of IT Hardware exports to $25 billion by 2010 as delineated by the recently concluded MAIT-Ernst & Young Study", remarked Vinnie Mehta, Executive Director, MAIT.