India Aims For Single Window Clearance For IT Firms in China

Eyeing a big foothold in China's booming IT services industry, India aims to press Beijing for working out a "single window clearance" concept to enable Indian IT companies to enter the Communist giant's market.

"Hopefully we are able to negotiate a single window" concept to enable IT companies to enter the Chinese markets, A K Garg, Additional Director of the Department of Electronics in the Indian Ministry of Communication and Information Technology, said.

India will keep pressing for a single window so that the Indian IT firms which are struggling to gain a foothold can enter Chinese markets, Mr Garg who was part of the 60 member Indian services delegation who came here to take part in the 3rd China International Fair for Trade in Services (CIFTIS) in Beijing told PTI.

"We need access to their markets and need to update our industry how to handle their regulatory and licensing issues to enter this market.

This is what we want to address so that our industries get a foothold into this market", Mr Garg, who also took part in India-China round table meeting on May 29 said on the sidelines of the Fair.

He said the Chinese market is huge with estimates of $50 billion-$1 trillion.

There is need for Indian industry to understand Chinese regulatory system to gain entry.

He said MoU signed between the two countries in last March during Strategic Economic Dialogue (SED), headed by the then Planning Commission Chairman, Montek Singh Ahluwalia will come in handy to further the IT cooperation between the two countries.

The MoU is a big step forward as China came forward and acknowledged the need to engage with Indian IT industry, Mr Garg said, adding that Indian IT companies too should pro-actively engage Chinese markets.

India highlights the entry of Indian IT firms into Chinese markets as an important step by China to address the over $35 billion trade gap between the two countries.

Addressing the meeting, India Ambassador Ashok Kantha said despite the complementarities in the IT, Indian and China made limited progress in exploiting them.

The Indian IT industry in China employs over 20,000 with over 90 per cent of them being Chinese nationals.

Like Chinese companies Huawei and ZTE which are doing well in India, expectations are that the Indian IT firms also do well in China, he said.

The Indian IT companies and Chinese State owned Enterprises (SOES) could work together in third countries as multinationals.

The new government headed by Prime Minister, Narendra Modi, has a vision of developing the industry in harmony with global community, he said.

Lu Zhijun, Director General of China's State-owned Assets Supervision and Administration Commission (SASAC) suggested that India and China could set up a bilateral mechanism on the lines that existed between China-South Africa facilitating easy trade and business and exchanges between the two countries.

To build platform both of us have to have smooth communication to explore and achieve win-win results, he said.

Leading Chinese SOEs such as State Grid, China Mobile, CNPC, CNOOC, Huaneng, Shenhua participated besides Indian Companies like Infosys and WIPRO took part in the Round Table.

This is the first ever such interaction between Chinese SOEs and Indian IT companies.

Another IT workshop on the licensing and regulatory regime in China was held in partnership with the China Software Industry Association and NASSCOM, and supported by the Ministry of Industry and information Technology of China and the Ministry of Commerce and Industry of India.

Apart from above, each sectoral delegation had detailed meetings with Chinese stakeholders and site visits to discuss cooperation possibilities.

The interaction was facilitated by the Indian Embassy in Beijing in coordination with the Confederation of Indian Industry (CII), Shanghai.