'IT helping Indian firms go global'

Besides evolving as the backbone of business development, information technology (IT), as a tool, is playing a key role in helping large Indian companies graduate to global players, according to K Venkataramanan, president, operations & member of the board of Larsen & Toubro Limited.

Delivering the keynote address on 'building business value through IT' at a seminar organised by the CIO's Forum of the Confederation of Indian Industry (CII), Venkataramanan said IT was also helping companies like L&T bring in coherence and coordination at higher levels without compromising the decentralised environment of decision-making and project implementation.

He said that L&T was aiming at 40 per cent reduction in lead time through the integrated SAP management in the organisation.

"IT has already made its presence felt in certain pockets of excellence in large companies. The challenge is to expand its horizon encompassing each and every aspect of the company's operations," he said, adding that quantifying the return on IT investment in an organisation had to be worked out to bring better synergies in terms of results.

Srini Raju, founder and managing director of iLabs Capital Private Limited, who spoke on emerging knowledge society, said globalisation and services industry was helping bring in great value-addition to the country's predominantly agriculture-oriented economy.

The current trend of outsourcing in IT, media and other sectors is helping India build the knowledge economy, he said.