India poised to become next global SaaS capital: Report

Source: The post is based on the article “India poised to become next global SaaS capital: Report” published in Livemint on 27th August 2022.

What is the News?

The Confederation of Indian Industry(CII) and Ernst & Young Global Limited(EY) have released a study titled “India: The next global SaaS capital”.

What is Software-as-a-Service (SaaS)?

Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) is a software licensing model in which access to the software is provided on a subscription basis with the software being located on external servers rather than on servers located in-house.

SaaS allows each user to access programs via the Internet, instead of having to install the software on the user’s computer.

SaaS has many business applications, including file sharing, email, calendars, customer retention management and human resources.

SaaS is easy to implement, easy to update and debug and can be less expensive (or at least have lower up-front costs) since users pay for SaaS as they go instead of purchasing multiple software licenses for multiple computers.

Drawbacks to the adoption of SaaS center around data security, speed of delivery and lack of control.

What does the study say about the Indian SaaS market?

India is poised to become the global Software as a Service (SaaS) capital over the next few years mainly driven by Small and Medium Businesses with a focus on large enterprises.

The Indian SaaS market is expected to grow multi-fold by 2025 accounting for almost 7 to 10% of the global SaaS market from 2 to 4% at present.

Compared to one in 2018, India now has 18 SaaS unicorns with the country being the third-largest SaaS ecosystem globally, after the USA and China.