Information Technology Jobs Moving From India to Pakistan?
Outlook India recently ran a story headlined "Noida to Islamabad". It suggests at least anecdotal evidence of information technology jobs beginning to move from India to Pakistan. The number of jobs is only 125 but could it be the tip of a larger iceberg? Are western companies finding Pakistan becoming more competitive with India in terms of cost and skills on offer? Let's try and answer these questions.
Noida to Islamabad:
Outlook India report said 125 employees at a US-based information technology service provider were laid off in Noida in New Delhi, India, and the very next day an equal number of workers started working for the company in Islamabad, Pakistan. Here's an excerpt of Outlook India story:
"On the night of November 1, stretching into early next morning, close to half the workforce at the Noida office of a US-based IT service provider was informed that their services were no longer needed. A former employee says salaries for the staff at the Noida office were declared delayed by a day on October 31. The official explanation was that the servers were not working. “They weren’t clear about how many people were going to be laid off,” he says. The next night, they “axed 125 people in half-an-hour.” They all got a severance package—a cheque for October and another two months of salary—and a termination letter. Rumors of layoffs had started doing the rounds four to five months ago. The talk was that the company was opening offices in a neighboring country. Curiously, the day the workforce in Noida was sacked, almost the same number of employees for the same low-level IT-enabled jobs logged into their systems, 676 kilometers away, in Islamabad, Pakistan. Job cuts have plagued the Indian IT sector for about two years now and have begun to get pretty serious from the start of this year. “Bloodbath in Bangalore” has been the recurring headline. But the trend of these jobs going to techies in Pakistan is more recent. Away from all the noise of ceasefire violations and surgical strikes, where Pakistan could really hurt India is in taking away low-end IT jobs. The neighbor has a budding IT industry, growing in its own space, looking to emulate the Indian IT success story where right now data operators and BPO callers come much cheaper."
The story did not identify the company by name.
Pakistan: The Next Software Hub?
There are tens of thousands of Pakistani IT engineers working in the West, particularly in Silicon Valley, the high-tech capital of the world. The popular entertainment industry recognizes this fact by featuring a Pakistani-American software engineer in lead role played by a real-life Pakistani-American Kumail Nanjiani in HBO's "Silicon Valley" serial. Articles like the New York Times Op Ed piece in 2015 titled "Pakistan, the Next Software Hub?" have helped raise the profile of Pakistan's information technology industry in the West.
Afiniti and Careem: Tech Unicorns Made in Pakistan:
Afiniti and Careem are two technology unicorns engineered in Pakistan by Pakistanis. AI (artificial intelligence) startup Afiniti software has largely been engineered in Lahore while taxi hailing service Careem's technology has mostly been developed in Karachi.
Careem is a taxi hailing app that is giving its American competitor Uber a run for its money in a region stretching from Pakistan to the Middle East and North Africa. The company cofounded by Mudassir Sheika, a Pakistani national, is headquartered in Dubai in the United Arab Emirates.
Careem's software has been developed by its technology partner VentureDive based in Karachi, Pakistan. VentureDive was started by serial Pakistani entrepreneur Atif Azim who sold his earlier startup Perfigo to network equipment giant Cisco for $74 million in 2004, according to a report in Tech in Asia.
Washington D.C. based AI technology firm Afiniti, founded by serial Pakistani-American entrepreneur Zia Chishti, has filed for initial public offering (IPO) at $1.6 billion valuation, according to VentureBeat. The company has grown out of the technology used in the Pakistan-based call center business of The Resource Group (TRG) also founded by Zia Chishti.
Bulk of the Afiniti development team is located in Thokar Niaz Baig, Lahore. In addition, the company has development team members in Islamabad and Karachi.
Numbers, Skills and Cost:
Pakistani universities are producing over 10,000 IT engineers annually. Many of them have demonstrated their quality and skills by freelancing for American and European companies. Pakistani freelancers consistently rank among the top three year after year.
In terms of cost, Pakistani engineers cost significantly less than engineers in India and elsewhere. The average salary of a software engineer ($110,000) in Silicon Valley is about 20X more than the average salaries in India ($6,875) and Pakistan ($4,770), according to Glassdoor.
Summary:
Recent move of 125 IT jobs from Noida to Islamabad in an indication that Pakistan is becoming an attractive destination for software and information technology companies looking for highly skilled talent at significant discounts. It is an emerging center of technology with at least two unicorns, Afiniti and Careem, engineered by Pakistanis in Pakistan. With growing numbers of young homegrown Pakistani technologists, a highly skilled diaspora and an evolving startup ecosystem with incubators, accelerators and investors, the country is beginning to demonstrate its vast potential as a vibrant technology hub of the future. Provincial governments, particularly those in Punjab and KP, are showing leadership in encouraging this trend. The main ingredients are all coming together to make things happen in Pakistan.
Related Links:
Haq's Musings
OPEN Silicon Valley Forum 2017: Pakistani Entrepreneurs Conference
Pakistani-American's Tech Unicorn Files For IPO at $1.6 Billion Valuation
Pakistani-American Cofounders Sell Startup to Cisco for $610 million
Pakistani Brothers Spawned $20 Billion Security Software Industry
Pakistani-American Ashar Aziz's Fireeye Goes Public
Pakistani-American Pioneered 3D Technology in Orthodontics
Pakistani-Americans Enabling 2nd Machine Revolution
Pakistani-American Shahid Khan Richest South Asian in America
Two Pakistani-American Silicon Valley Techs Among Top 5 VC Deals
Pakistani-American's Game-Changing Vision
Outlook India report said 125 employees at a US-based information technology service provider were laid off in Noida in New Delhi, India, and the very next day an equal number of workers started working for the company in Islamabad, Pakistan. Here's an excerpt of Outlook India story:
"On the night of November 1, stretching into early next morning, close to half the workforce at the Noida office of a US-based IT service provider was informed that their services were no longer needed. A former employee says salaries for the staff at the Noida office were declared delayed by a day on October 31. The official explanation was that the servers were not working. “They weren’t clear about how many people were going to be laid off,” he says. The next night, they “axed 125 people in half-an-hour.” They all got a severance package—a cheque for October and another two months of salary—and a termination letter. Rumors of layoffs had started doing the rounds four to five months ago. The talk was that the company was opening offices in a neighboring country. Curiously, the day the workforce in Noida was sacked, almost the same number of employees for the same low-level IT-enabled jobs logged into their systems, 676 kilometers away, in Islamabad, Pakistan. Job cuts have plagued the Indian IT sector for about two years now and have begun to get pretty serious from the start of this year. “Bloodbath in Bangalore” has been the recurring headline. But the trend of these jobs going to techies in Pakistan is more recent. Away from all the noise of ceasefire violations and surgical strikes, where Pakistan could really hurt India is in taking away low-end IT jobs. The neighbor has a budding IT industry, growing in its own space, looking to emulate the Indian IT success story where right now data operators and BPO callers come much cheaper."
The story did not identify the company by name.
Pakistan: The Next Software Hub?
There are tens of thousands of Pakistani IT engineers working in the West, particularly in Silicon Valley, the high-tech capital of the world. The popular entertainment industry recognizes this fact by featuring a Pakistani-American software engineer in lead role played by a real-life Pakistani-American Kumail Nanjiani in HBO's "Silicon Valley" serial. Articles like the New York Times Op Ed piece in 2015 titled "Pakistan, the Next Software Hub?" have helped raise the profile of Pakistan's information technology industry in the West.
Afiniti and Careem: Tech Unicorns Made in Pakistan:
Afiniti and Careem are two technology unicorns engineered in Pakistan by Pakistanis. AI (artificial intelligence) startup Afiniti software has largely been engineered in Lahore while taxi hailing service Careem's technology has mostly been developed in Karachi.
Careem is a taxi hailing app that is giving its American competitor Uber a run for its money in a region stretching from Pakistan to the Middle East and North Africa. The company cofounded by Mudassir Sheika, a Pakistani national, is headquartered in Dubai in the United Arab Emirates.
Careem's software has been developed by its technology partner VentureDive based in Karachi, Pakistan. VentureDive was started by serial Pakistani entrepreneur Atif Azim who sold his earlier startup Perfigo to network equipment giant Cisco for $74 million in 2004, according to a report in Tech in Asia.
Washington D.C. based AI technology firm Afiniti, founded by serial Pakistani-American entrepreneur Zia Chishti, has filed for initial public offering (IPO) at $1.6 billion valuation, according to VentureBeat. The company has grown out of the technology used in the Pakistan-based call center business of The Resource Group (TRG) also founded by Zia Chishti.
Bulk of the Afiniti development team is located in Thokar Niaz Baig, Lahore. In addition, the company has development team members in Islamabad and Karachi.
Numbers, Skills and Cost:
Pakistani universities are producing over 10,000 IT engineers annually. Many of them have demonstrated their quality and skills by freelancing for American and European companies. Pakistani freelancers consistently rank among the top three year after year.
In terms of cost, Pakistani engineers cost significantly less than engineers in India and elsewhere. The average salary of a software engineer ($110,000) in Silicon Valley is about 20X more than the average salaries in India ($6,875) and Pakistan ($4,770), according to Glassdoor.
 |
| Source: Glassdoor |
Recent move of 125 IT jobs from Noida to Islamabad in an indication that Pakistan is becoming an attractive destination for software and information technology companies looking for highly skilled talent at significant discounts. It is an emerging center of technology with at least two unicorns, Afiniti and Careem, engineered by Pakistanis in Pakistan. With growing numbers of young homegrown Pakistani technologists, a highly skilled diaspora and an evolving startup ecosystem with incubators, accelerators and investors, the country is beginning to demonstrate its vast potential as a vibrant technology hub of the future. Provincial governments, particularly those in Punjab and KP, are showing leadership in encouraging this trend. The main ingredients are all coming together to make things happen in Pakistan.
Related Links:
Haq's Musings
OPEN Silicon Valley Forum 2017: Pakistani Entrepreneurs Conference
Pakistani-American's Tech Unicorn Files For IPO at $1.6 Billion Valuation
Pakistani-American Cofounders Sell Startup to Cisco for $610 million
Pakistani Brothers Spawned $20 Billion Security Software Industry
Pakistani-American Ashar Aziz's Fireeye Goes Public
Pakistani-American Pioneered 3D Technology in Orthodontics
Pakistani-Americans Enabling 2nd Machine Revolution
Pakistani-American Shahid Khan Richest South Asian in America
Two Pakistani-American Silicon Valley Techs Among Top 5 VC Deals
Pakistani-American's Game-Changing Vision
Comments
During the past 4 years, IT Industry has contributed 98% to Pakistan’s economy by foreign exchange earnings, as stated by Minister for IT Anusha Rehman. IT industry in Pakistan is flourishing as Pakistan has earned $54.37m by exporting software consultancy services, showing growth of 69.22 percent as compared to exports of $32.126m last year.
According to the data revealed by PBS, hardware consultancy services exports have also seen an increase of 144.41 percent to $0.72 million as compared to the last year’s export of $0.3 million of the same services. Similarly, the maintenance and repair services for computers also seen a slight increase of $0.39 million as compared to $0.23 million of last year, showing growth of 68.97 million.
In general, the exports of the country have earlier seen a decline by 12% in the past fiscal year 2015-16, while the current fiscal year seems to get a boost by the export services of IT and Telecom sector. However, the trade of computer software services observed a negative growth of 1.01 percent during first two months, declining to $40.766 million this year from $41.181 million during the last year.
However, the export of telecommunication services has not been a much success for Pakistan. The export of telecom services from the country decreased by 0.93 percent by going down from the trade of $63.43 million last year to $62.84 million during the current fiscal year.
It must be noted that general services exports from Pakistan have seen an immense increase by 4.94 percent during the period under review while comparing to the same period of last year. With this considerable increase of $816.27 million of this year, compared to the exports of 777.84 million in last year, Pakistan is witnessing the great potential of its IT and Telecom sector in this era of digitalization.
https://www.techjuice.pk/pakistan-earned-111-million-computer-services-exports/
The exports of Information and Communication Technology (ICT) services and related sectors have registered a double digit growth of 14.5 per cent, surging to US $ 252 million during first quarter of this year.
During same period of July to September 2016-17, the exports recorded in this domain were US $ 220.2 million.
The statistics issued by State Bank of Pakistan have showed that local companies and startups related to Information Technology (IT) and similar sectors have continued to expand their market share in foreign market as value of exports recorded double digit growth.
Pakistani companies usually export ICT services to United States, Middle East and North African countries. Major heads of exports included software and hardware consultancy, telecommunication services, call center services and export of software.
In last financial year 2016-17, IT exports and related services touched nearly US $ 1 billion reaching an all-time high. It is expected that exports will cross the US $ 1 billion mark this year.
According to Pakistan Software Exports Board (PSEB), Pakistan’s has been showing a healthy growth rate of IT & ITES exports in South Asia during the last three years. It grew by 71 per cent from June 2013 to June 2016.
In last financial year as well, Pakistan’s IT and related services exports have grown at a faster pace than India and Sri Lanka. Pakistan’s growth rate during 2016-17 was 16 per cent whereas Sri Lanka was at 5 per cent.
The statistics of IT services exports are usually labelled as remittances under IT sector but the industry strongly believes that overall exports are three times higher than the reported numbers which includes exports of services by freelancers and various IT services in different sectors such as financial and textile sectors.
Accordingly, the exports of IT and related services stand US $ 756 million by end of first quarter of 2017-18, which will likely to touch a mark of US $ 3 billion as per estimates.
In this regard, the central bank is working to bring IT companies and service providers on-board. It has designed a reporting structure of inflows that will help in increasing inflows of IT sector in future if companies follow this pattern.—APP
https://www.pakistantoday.com.pk/2017/12/28/international-conference-on-emerging-technologies-chairman-hec-for-translating-opportunities-into-reality/
Higher Education Commission (HEC) Chairman Dr Mukhtar Ahmed has stressed on the need for translating the opportunities created by new technologies into reality while ensuring a positive use of advanced gadgets.
He said that the HEC is committed to facilitating universities and encouraging research activities. “We need to conduct researches that cast positive impacts on society and mitigates the miseries of humanity,” he underlined.
He expressed these views while speaking as a chief guest at the two-day 13th International Conference on Emerging Technologies (ICET) jointly organized by the Capital University of Science and Technology (CUST), in collaboration with the HEC and Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE) Islamabad.
CUST Vice-Chancellor Dr Mansoor Ahmed, Professor Aamer Iqbal Bhatti, ICET General Chair and a large number of faculty members and students were also present on the occasion.
The HEC Chairman pointed out that water and food security will become vital issues in the near future. He emphasised that the solution to all social ills including terrorism, poverty and unemployment lies in the promotion of education.
“It is the era of a knowledge economy and no nation can make progress without promoting education,” he stated. He said that the universities are responsible for imparting education, creating knowledge and integrating it into society. He urged the faculty to pay special attention to the training of students, as training is imperative for a peaceful society.
Shedding light on the achievements of the HEC during the last 15 years, the chairman said that HEC set off on its journey when Pakistan had only 59 universities, adding that the number of universities in the country has now reached 188. He maintained that the HEC has been putting strenuous efforts to promote ICT in the country.
“Pakistan has one of the best ICT setups of South Asia”, he informed.
He also announced that the HEC plans to establish centres of excellence in data and artificial intelligence.
Sharing the background of the conference, Professor Aamer Iqbal Bhatti said that the first international conference on emerging technologies was held in 2005. He said CUST lays great emphasis on applied research and the 13th ICET is a testimony to that fact. He appreciated the role of the HEC and IEEE Islamabad in collaborating to organise the conference.
https://qz.com/1152683/indian-it-layoffs-in-2017-top-56000-led-by-tcs-infosys-cognizant/
For Indian techies, 2017 was the stuff of nightmares.
Since Trump took office, the fate of the H-1B, a six-year temporary work visa that Indian IT companies heavily depend on, has been hanging fire.
In March 2017, the US government stalled the premium processing of this visa category.
The criteria for computer programmers to apply for the H-1B visa became tougher. In April, Trump signed the “Buy American, Hire American” executive order, promising to bring jobs back to the country, putting migrant workers in jeopardy. In November, the judicial committee of the US House of Representatives gave its nod to the Protect and Grow American Jobs Act (titled HR 170) which classifies any company that has more 15% of its workforce working on-site as “visa-dependent.” With this, the pressure is mounting on Indian outsourcing giants which sometimes have over 50% of their manpower working on-site.
Even the current workers have cause for concern—to clamp down on visa fraud, the United States Customs and Immigration Services (USCIS) plans to double the number of visits to workplaces. “Indian IT companies, thus far champions of IT-based outsourcing, have been forced to go back to the drawing board in order to reposition themselves higher up in the value chain,” Anshul Prakash, a partner at Mumbai-based legal services firm Khaitan & Co, told Quartz.
---------------
One of the top employment generators until a few years ago, India’s $160 billion IT industry laid off more than 56,000 employees this year. Some analysts believe this spree was worse than the one during the 2008 financial crisis. Meanwhile, hiring plummeted, with entry-level openings having more than halved in 2017, according to experts.
Tata Consultancy Services (TCS) and Infosys, two of India’s largest IT companies and once leaders in job creation, reduced their headcounts for the first time ever. Even mid-sized players like Tech Mahindra retrenched several employees. (However, TCS’s staff addition recovered after a fall during April-June 2017 and rose 0.8% in the following quarter).
“Digitisation and automation brought about disruption in traditional roles, which means that most of the IT firms found themselves reassessing the capability of the talent pool to stay market relevant,” Arun Paul, vice-president of human resources at Incedo, an IT service management company, told Quartz.
When hell broke loose
Compared to the normal rate of forced attrition (i.e. asking non-performers to leave) of around 1% in earlier years, 2017 saw Indian IT companies letting go of between 2% and 6% of their employees, said Alka Dhingra, general manager of IT staffing at TeamLease Services.
Infosys cut 9,000 jobs in January. “Instead of 10 people, what if we have three people to work on (a project). If we don’t have the software, then some others will take the advantage (away from us),” Vishal Sikka, the former CEO of the Bengaluru-based company, said in February.
Meanwhile, around 6,000 Indian employees at Cognizant reportedly lost their jobs to automation. Mumbai-based Tech Mahindra implemented a cost optimisation plan of increasing automation and reducing manpower. It turned ugly in July when the firm made headlines over a controversial audio clip that featured an HR personnel purportedly coercing an employee into quitting by 10am the next day, or risk being fired.
Moreover, it wasn’t just about those at the bottom of the IT pyramid. Pink slips were doled out to even senior employees with outdated skills.
https://www.brecorder.com/2018/02/20/400051/ideas-meet-investments-momentum-pakistan-2018-kicks-off-in-karachi/
Startups, entrepreneurs, tech giants, social media stars, musicians; Momentum’18, one of Pakistan’s biggest tech conference, had it all covered under one roof.
Pakistan’s most awaited tech conference, Momentum Pakistan 2018 initiated yesterday, February 19 and will also continue today, February 20. The annual event attracted numerous startups, entrepreneurs, incubators, and national and international investors. The conference also hosted number of global companies including Facebook, Google, Amazon, Microsoft, IBM and many others, of which’s delegates along with setting up their stalls, gave inspirational speeches too.
“I think this is a great platform where tech startups, investors, and IT vendors can meet and get support. My aim is to help these startups grow in Pakistan and abroad by giving them a platform,” expressed Chrystele Dumont from Microsoft.
The conference was a home for 250+ startups. Ranging from e-commerce and marketing based, to incorporating artificial intelligence (AI) into everyday products and turning them into smart technology, the conference contained all.
Ignite, Qubolt, Fori Mazdoori, Botsify etc. were among the many names promoting their various products such as chat bots, holograms, robots, smart courier services and more.
The conference proved to be a great platform for women too who showcased their products. Developing smart technology such as ‘Rough Road Detection’, brain-driven ‘Intellectual Wheel Chair’, ‘Vision Detector’ for visually impaired, and ‘iSecure’ smart watches for eradicating child abduction etc. proved that women are no less than men.
“It’s time for us women to have a ripple effect and be positive,” expressed Gia Farooqui, CEO of Roshni Rides.
The Pakistani Indian, Asha Jadeja from Dot Edu Ventures also said, “Pakistan has the most exciting ecosystem that is growing. Technology is at its beginning phase here and it is developing more.”
Moreover, the conference also consisted of amazing speakers and panels from startups and from renowned firms all across the world. Asha Jadeja from Dot Edu Ventures, CEO of Foodpanda, Telenor, Careem etc., USAID representatives, Lashley Pulcifer from Hashoo Groups, Chrystele Dumont from Microsoft, were a few of the esteemed speakers that spoke on different topics regarding investments, women empowerment, Pakistani entrepreneurial ecosystem, tech startups and much more.
“Events like these are very important, they bring together everyone to inspire,” said Lashley Pulcifer, Chief Marketing Officer of Hashoo Group.
Lastly, the day was not all about speeches and promotional stalls. The event’s first day ended with a standup comedy by the popular social media star Junaid Akram where he left the audience laughing. It was followed by a concert from the ‘Call’ that marked a perfect ending to the first day of Momentum Pakistan 2018.
Talking about the event, Junaid Akram said, “This is a platform to bring startups together. Things like these are not highlighted in Pakistan, and events like these bring everyone under one roof, bridging investors and creators.”
https://profit.pakistantoday.com.pk/2018/06/26/pakistan-4th-most-popular-country-for-freelancing-report/
Pakistan is among the top five countries in the world when it comes to freelancing and generated a significant calculated amount of $0.5 billion entirely from freelancing.
Pakistan is ranked as the 4th most popular country for freelancing in the Online Labor Index published in 2017 by Oxford Internet Institute (OII) and is consistently ranked among the top destinations for Internet Communications and Technology (ICT) outsourcing as a result of the exponential growth of the IT sector. Pakistan has got the fourth position globally in the category of Software Development and Technology.
Talking to the media, a ministry official said, the calculated revenue is $0.5 billion but in reality, it is more than this amount. The framework for e-commerce is not implemented yet, and after the implementation of an official, state-backed framework, it would be channelised to contribute to the national exchequer.
He said many universities in Pakistan are offering software and IT degrees and due to demand of this field many individuals have chosen to opt for ever-growing field.
Many people work from home and earn a good amount. Many people in Pakistan manage to freelance with their regular jobs to make a good amount of money, he added.
He informed that the first, second and third positions are acquired by India, Bangladesh and United States respectively. The largest overall supplier of online labour according to the data, is the traditional outsourcing destination – India, which is home to 24 per cent of the workers observed. According to report, Pakistan is home to 9 per cent of total freelancers.
https://twitter.com/haqsmusings/status/1034492236279345152
https://www.techjuice.pk/pakistans-it-export-crossed-1-billion-mark-for-the-first-time-in-history/
https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/business/india-business/hardware-software-jobs-pay-the-highest-in-india/articleshow/66744465.cms
Hardware & networking jobs fetch about Rs 15 lakh per an .. software jobs fetch about Rs 12 lakh, and consumer jobs Rs 9 lakh.
(One US $ is worth 71 Indian rupees)
Overfunding and bloated valuations have destabilized the country's startups
In 2014, Kunal Bahl and Rohit Bansal, the founders of Delhi-based e-commerce company Snapdeal, boarded a plane to Tokyo. Their company had just struggled through a transition from a Groupon-like discount voucher seller to a full online retail marketplace, and had nearly failed -- but Bahl and Bansal had managed to turn it around. They brought in $850 million from major investors, including sovereign wealth fund Temasek Holdings, Ratan Tata, the head of Tata Group, and U.S. chipmaker Intel. EBay even approached Snapdeal with a proposal to acquire the business.
Instead, Bahl and Bansal flew to Japan to meet the global tech sector's kingmaker -- Masayoshi Son, the founder and CEO of SoftBank Group. Even though Snapdeal had pulled in hundreds of millions, investment flows into India were still just a trickle. Chinese giants Alibaba Group Holding and Tencent Holdings were yet to enter the market at scale, and there were few local funds investing in technology. SoftBank was just starting to seek out deals in India, in an early display of its now-familiar playbook: offering to inject vast sums of money, and driving valuations higher than any other investor could offer young entrepreneurs.
Warned that Son had a short attention span, Snapdeal's founders brought only 10 slides to accompany their presentation. They had got through just three when Son cut off their pitch. "I have heard enough," he told them. "I will give you $1 billion for 49% of your company."
The amount was far more than the pair sought, or could even use. Ultimately, the two sides agreed on an infusion of $650 million for more than 30% of the company. "It was Snapdeal's first rodeo with so much capital," says one insider.
SoftBank's Vision Fund, with nearly $100 billion of capital, has become perhaps the most powerful funder in global technology. (Photo by Ken Kobayashi)
Dozens of entrepreneurs all over the world have had a similar experience. No investor has been more obliging than SoftBank's Son in writing massive checks to young companies, giving them the financial firepower to out-compete their rivals while pumping up their valuations. And that same pattern has played out in India, where, until recently, there was virtually no domestic risk capital, making SoftBank the biggest game in town. "SoftBank did put India on the global map," says Vinish Kathuria, a Delhi-based venture capitalist.
Since then, SoftBank's Vision Fund, with nearly $100 billion of capital supplied by major sovereign wealth funds, tech companies and private investors, has become perhaps the most powerful funder in global technology. It has fueled a wave of disruptive companies, from ride-hailers Uber Technologies and Grab to office communication business Slack Technologies.
Now, the wheels are coming off. WeWork, the office rental company into which SoftBank had invested billions, announced in September that it would list in New York, seeking an extraordinary valuation of $47 billion. The company's prospectus revealed a business model and a highly unusual governance structure that rattled investors. Its valuation dwindled, and eventually the listing was pulled.
“Well, there is no problem with what the developer has done. He paid for it and got the script which is okay. But the problem is with people and Media referring to as Indian made app which is not the truth.”
Irfan Sheikh, Founder & CEO, QBoxus
fbtw
The Pakistani company has raised two specific issues:
The real author of the app to be acknowledged and credited instead of attributing Shivank Agarwal as the creator of the app.
The absence of any original modifications to the purchased code. “The worst thing is that the developer even didn't bother to fix bugs and issues in the app and directly uploaded it on Play Store, which is really a shame,” he added.
The Quint has reached out to Mitron App for comments on the claims made by QBoxus along with details the publication has found. The story will be updated once Mitron responds.
Identical Login Screen
The login screen for both apps shares an identical schema as well. Both can be seen using “action_login.xml”
TicTic Strings Left Behind in Mitron’s Code
Further, a ‘change_log’ file present in the decompiled Mitron source code contains the string “com.dinosoftlabs.tictic” – which is the package name of the TicTic application developed and released by QBoxus.
However, there are some minor differences to be noted in the User Interface (UI).
The splash screen which welcomes the user to the app differs visually across both. Further, Mitron does not currently allow users to log in via Facebook, whereas TicTic does.
fbtw
Apart from this, the application programming interface (API) for both applications are completely identical, which alone allows one to fully ascertain the claim that Mitron is indeed only a re-skinned iteration of TicTic.
TicTic’s Security Flaw Also In Mitron
Regardless, while re-skinned applications are not an entirely new phenomenon, they come with their own drawbacks.
For instance, a vulnerability that exists in the original codebase is likely to propagate to all other instances of the application and remain unfixed in each and every one of them.
This is also the case for TicTic and Mitron, as both applications share a common security flaw in the way through which the ‘follow account’ action is handled.
fbtw
The flaw can allow a malicious actor to force other users to follow any given account, simply by tampering with a few parameters on the ‘follow user’ request.
Mitron Has A Different Backend Though
Although it would be correct to state that both applications share the same code base, it should be clarified that this does not mean the same backend is shared among both applications.
The Mitron app’s server and API are located on shopkiller.in, whereas the TicTic application communicates with bringthings.com. This means that both user data as well as uploaded videos for Mitron are stored on a separate server (an Amazon Web Services S3 instance to be specific) in contrast to TicTic.
This particular application was able to blur the lines between an individually developed platform versus a generic rip-off.
fbtw
This is made evident by the number of people who have so far downloaded and installed the application (a number which is resting at 5 million at the time of publication).
In the context of Mitron, it’s meteoric rise in popularity can probably be attributed to it being touted as an “Indian version” of Tik Tok.
According to data released by the State Bank of Pakistan, remittances under IT and IT-enabled services surged to $1.119 billion from July 2020 to January 2021 compared to $812 million recorded in the corresponding period of the last financial year, showing a handsome growth of 37 percent year-on-year
https://propakistani.pk/2021/02/23/pakistani-it-exports-cross-1-billion-taking-clients-from-indian-companies/
The growth in IT exports was driven by the increasing automation, and digitalized services in different countries after new ways of doing business emerged following the outbreak of COVID-19 worldwide.
Different foreign companies, mainly from the USA and EU markets, prefer placing their orders to Pakistani companies rather than Indian and the Philippines.
Barkan Saeed, Chairman Pakistan Software Houses Association (P@SHA) for IT and ITeS told Propakistani,
The growth in IT exports value was driven by the foreign clients moved from Indian companies to Pakistani companies in a post-COVID-19 scenario.
The government could double the exports from $2 billion per annum to $4 billion per annum by the next two years, with a concrete roadmap for the IT sector, which could not only fetch foreign exchange for the country, but it is a key sector that could provide the skilled job to millions of youngsters, Saeed further said.
Local IT companies and the government should work on a strategy to protect the growth of the IT sector on a sustainable basis for the future, he added.
Saeed demanded that IT should be declared a strategic sector with the same focus and treatment. The PM should resolve the pending issues of the sector immediately to unleash the true potential of the IT sector.