Donald Trump’s election is likely to impact Indian Information Technology (IT) industry — already battling challenges stemming from sluggish economic growth and automation — threatening jobs and profit margins.
“Donald Trump’s administration will add to the industry’s woes,” said Arup Roy, Research Director, Gartner. “Its protectionist views would further dampen growth prospects, if his views were to crystallise into some serious policy implementation.”
“However, what happens during campaigns and what actually transpires in office can vary greatly and we did get early signs of that in his victory speech, but at minimum it is headline risk and adds to the uncertain times,” added Mr. Roy.
During his election campaign, Mr. Trump had come out against IT companies, claiming that Indian employees were taking away American jobs using the H-1B visas. One of his promises had been to increase the H-1B wage to $100,000 per annum and to bring in strict immigration laws.
‘A bad day for industry’
“This is a bad day for the traditional Indian IT industry,” said Phil Fersht, CEO and Chief Analyst of U.S.-based analyst company HfS Research. “Trump has made it clear he intends to raise the minimum H-1B wage and will work to protect American jobs and U.S. firms at all costs,” he said.
Nasscom, the industry’s apex body said it was “look[ing] forward to working with Mr. Trump and his administration and leaders of the House and Senate to highlight the sector’s contributions to the U.S. economy and help ensure that they understand these facts as well as the depth of our investments”.
Some industry watchers believed that there would be some impact on the low-end outsourcing jobs. “However, high-skilled work will be done with Indian collaboration,” said an analyst, who also said that no regressive policy was expected from the new President.
