Georgia ranks sixth among the 50 U.S. states in the number of direct jobs created by India’s information technology sector operations and investments, according to a report released Tuesday by the National Association of Software and Services Companies.
The association is a trade organization and chamber of commerce for the IT and the business process management (BPM) industry in India. It released its report as Nirmala Sitharaman, arrived in Washington for the U.S.-India Strategic and Commercial Dialogue hosted by her counterpart U.S. Commerce Secretary Penny Pritzker.
The association’s news release identified California, Texas, Illinois, New Jersey, New York and Georgia as the states benefiting most from Indian IT sector operations and investments.
Although the release did not break out the totals for the individual states, it said that India-based IT companies providing services to American businesses and other customers invested more than $2 billion in 2011-13, paid $22.5 billion in taxes to the U.S. Treasury in the last five years and support more than 411,000 direct and indirect jobs in the U.S.
Ms. Sitharaman is quoted in the release concerning the growth in two-way flow of benefits from the U.S.-India bilateral economic engagement, saying, “This momentum is surely going to increase manifold with new partnership opportunities emerging in the areas of Digital India and Smart Cities for American technology firms.”
The report also lists several examples of grants by India-based IT services companies including a $5 million per year grant by Infosys for a nonprofit organization engaged in delivering
services, research and advocacy.
It also mentions an $8 million commitment from Wipro to support fellowships for STEM education teachers and a $35 million commitment from Tata Consultancy Services to Carnegie Mellon University for a new 40,000-square-foot technology building plus fellowships and scholarships for outstanding students.
Ms. Sitharaman came to Washington for the dialogue from Sept. 21-22.
During the dialogue Ms. Sitharaman met with U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry and Commerce Secretary Pritzker along with India’s External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj.
Their wide-ranging discussion included strategic cooperation on global issues, economic growth, defense and security cooperation and energy and the environment.
In terms of economic growth, they emphasized the importance of building commercial ties and encouraged further cooperation on innovation and entrepreneurship.
They also agreed to work toward removing barriers that affect their participation in global supply chains and to pursue sustained implementation of trade facilitation measures.
Additionally, they announced a private sector-led collaboration between the Confederation of Indian Industry and the American National Standards Institute to maintain and update a portal containing standards information for the use of industry, including small- and medium-sized enterprises.
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