Caretaker Federal Minister for Information Technology and Telecommunications (MoITT) Dr. Umar Saif distributed Rs825 million as cash prizes to companies playing a significant role in IT and IT services exports during the “IT and ITeS Export Award” organized by the Pakistan Software Export Board (PSEB), an organization of the Ministry of IT and Telecommunication, here at a local hotel on Tuesday.
Dr Umar Saif said that the IT industry was playing a pivotal role in the country’s economy and it deserved maximum incentives, facilities and rewards. “These companies are strengthening the country’s economy by earning huge foreign exchange in return for the services of digital talent of Pakistan worldwide.
If the performance of the IT sector continues like this, it is hoped that the target of 10 billion dollars for IT exports will be achieved soon,” he added.
The federal minister said that the IT Ministry had decided to encourage companies with a positive growth in IT exports, for which the government had allocated Rs1 billion in the annual budget. He said that due to timely decisions of the Special Investment Facilitation Council (SIFC) on the recommendations of the Ministry of IT, the overall IT exports in the country have increased by a record 32 percent in the last 60 days.
In the first and second quarters of the current financial year, the performance of many companies in IT exports also showed a positive trend. In such a situation, it was decided to give cash prizes from the allocated fund of one billion rupees to encourage the companies and accelerate growth.
Dr. Umar Saif said that out of the Rs1bn fund, Rs825 million had been distributed to 550 companies with positive growth. “For this purpose, six categories have been made; the first top 100 companies awarded Rs 2.5 million, the second 100 companies Rs 2 million, the third 100 companies Rs 1.5 million, the fourth 100 companies Rs 1.25 million, the fifth 100 companies Rs 750,000 and the sixth and last category 50 companies have been awarded Rs 500,000 each. Out of these 550 companies, the top 10 companies have been awarded cash prizes as well as trophies for the outstanding performance,” he elaborated.
He said that out of Rs 1 billion, the remaining Rs 175 million will be given to companies providing employment to IT skilled people. For this purpose, a particularly innovative endeavor is the Industry Co-Opt Program, developed in collaboration with HEC and P@SHA. This program seeks to provide apprenticeship opportunities to IT students.
To incentivize IT & ITeS exporters to participate in and support Co-Opt program in placing the final year students of bachelor’s degree in computer sciences and related computing technology fields as interns.
Estimated 3,500 interns will be placed in the IT & ITeS exporters that will be a part of the Co-Opt program and Rs. 50,000 per intern will be paid to the participant exporters.—APP
