Jio Platforms' success gives hope to struggling Indian IT vendors impacted by COVID-19, says GlobalData

• Challenges faced by Indian IT vendors are in stark contrast to global counterparts


• Indian tech companies have traditionally been IT services giants


• Interest in Jio Platforms will augur well for other Indian tech companies

Global technology companies have seen a rapid increase in their valuation over the past six months - with the most notable example being Apple passing the US$2 trillion mark in market capitalization (MCap) value. In contrast, many Indian IT vendors are struggling, having been affected considerably by the COVID-19 outbreak. While traditional Indian IT services giants have been waiting to tide over the impact of the pandemic, Jio Platforms has transformed into a tech juggernaut. While it may be difficult for others to replicate what Jio has achieved, the interest in Jio will definitely augur well for other Indian technology companies at a time when enterprises across the world are gearing up for digitization, says GlobalData, a leading data and analytics company.

Nishant Singh, Director of Technology at GlobalData, says: "While Indian IT vendors seeing such stark contrast to global counterparts is unfortunate, this is just the nature of the IT services business model, which, in contrast to software, needs projects in the pipeline. With the COVID-19 outbreak, enterprises halted all non-critical expenses, including plans to upgrade or transform their IT infrastructure. This has had an impact on Indian IT companies, since most of their revenues are from IT services.

"A lot of the faith in global technology companies comes from the fact that they have a pretty robust suite of intellectual property, including hardware, software and ecosystems that serve consumers and enterprises alike. The growth in stock prices merely reaffirms that technology companies – primarily 'Big Tech' companies – are well poised to tide over the pandemic-induced recession."

Big Indian technology companies such as TCS, Infosys, Wipro and HCL have traditionally been IT services giants. Unlike their counterparts in the software space, IT services companies typically do not have a large stash of intellectual property, making it slightly difficult for the market to distinguish between the IT services companies. For example, TCS – India's biggest IT services company – has only managed to recover the valuation it had lost owing to the pandemic. The company has also been in the news recently due to the intellectual property lawsuit filed against it by Epic Systems Corp.

Despite these struggles, the near future should see the market showing more confidence in the traditional Indian IT vendors. Singh adds: "With enterprises across the world now gearing up for digitization, Indian IT services vendors will witness a lot of action. Coupled with the market euphoria witnessed for Jio, the technology landscape in India could well witness a drastic revival in investor confidence."

Analysts available for interview. Please contact Aarti Chandrseker at the GlobalData Press Office for comment on +91 40 6616 6809 / +44 (0)207 936 6400 or email: pr@globaldata.com.

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Reliance Jio To Mimmick Apple's HealthKit Features In India

Mukesh Ambani's Jio has been creating headlines since its launch. Whether it was the introductory free offer or the New Year offer, Jio has awaken the telecom sector like never. It's bouquet of apps that come at no charge to its subscribers, is the telecom newbie's strategy to lure people away from Apple Music, Netflix and a range of various other services. And now, Jio has gone ahead and unveiled a new app called the Jio Health Hub, which is being considered as a rival of Apple's HomeKit, and Google's Health services.

Apple's HomeKit, and Google's Health services have acquired a unique status in the Health-tech sector. For the unversed, the two famous services retrieve medical and fitness information from other similar apps and act as a central dashboard. Apple's HomeKit has also entered into partnerships with various hospitals so as to directly feed patient information via its HealthKit.



According to Jio's app description, all of its data is stored in the cloud which is accessible from anywhere and on any device but with only with a user's secure credentials, meaning one can carry their medical records with them everywhere without having to go through the trouble of carrying physical files, papers, test reports etc.

The app's Health Charts gives its users an option to track their health parameters and easily view trends. It also allows users to view X-Rays, MRI, CT scans right on their phones and thus makes taking second opinion remotely on medical scans easier than ever before.

Just like Apple, Jio has also joined hands with with a number of hospitals and labs, which will be automatically pushing medical records to the Jio Health Hub app. However, the app hasn't yet given a list of the hospitals it has entered into a partnership with.

Currently only available on Google Play Store, the app also allows its users to store all their medical records in the app from the non-partner hospitals, too. According to description given of the app in the Play Store, a user is just required to take a picture of the record using their phone's camera and then simply save the image taken in the Jio Health Hub app.

With the pace at which Jio is growing day by day, it is surely going to become a numero uno player in the Indian telecom sector in sometime soon.

[Images: Google Play Store]