Pakistan's Progress In Information And Technology

[HariPrasad]

Why Pakistan's IT exports are dismal?

Pakistan IT Exports Grew by 98 % to USD 1.25 Billion During Last Five Years :

View attachment 154798

Pakistan Should do much better than this. Just 333 mn USd in 2013 is too bad. Pakistan need to explore the ways to raise it sharply.

 

[Will Strout]

Pakistan has not yet been developed in IT. When compared with the other nations around the world and the neighbors as well, Pakistan is a little bit backward in the application as well as development of information technology. However, there are people we can find who are brilliant, but not getting enough opportunities because of lack of development in the field. If the dean of education system in Pakistan look forward to the growth in education in Pakistan, moreover in the field of IT as well.

 

[Sana Ellahi]

I hope one day we can be as successful as we deserve to be.

 

[Hashiva]

LinkedIn to set up offices in Pakistan

KARACHI: LinkedIn, an international professional networking platform, is planning to establish its offices in Pakistan, Board of Investment (BOI) Chairman Saleem H Mandviwalla revealed here on Monday.
Mandviwalla said that the move would help LinkedIn promote Pakistan on its widely-used website. He said he hoped that LinkedIn’s offices would be operational in Pakistan either by the end of this year, or by the beginning of next year. This will lead to the setting up of LinkedIn’s proper operations in Pakistan, he said.
The BOI chief believed that the initial investment by the company would be to the tune of $10 million, and that LinkedIn is focusing on Pakistan as one of its important markets. “This is of great interest to us,” Mandviwalla added.
He said he had been informed that around 1.2 million Pakistanis connect to LinkedIn’s website, which includes overseas Pakistanis, besides those living in this country. Mandviwalla said the concept of the website is to connect professionals and businessmen with each other. “In my view, this is a very serious network,” he noted; adding that finding job for subscribers is one of the website’s major activities.
“The BOI would like to use LinkedIn as an effective tool and important platform,” he said. Mandviwalla said he had had a detailed discussion with LinkedIn Director Fredrick Berscl regarding the move.

Do you have any official declaration link of this post ?

Yes, Pakistan Bangla desh India, and Now nepal too every one growing in IT.

 

[ghazi52]

 

[Asian.Century]

Mobile Governance is the Way Forward for Pakistan

Good governance is essential for sustainable development of a country. Unfortunately that is exactly what has been lacking in Pakistan since its inception over 60 years ago.

Now, however, with our country going through a technology boom there is renewed hope with e-governance gearing up to take centre stage.

Mobile phones are a useful and an essential tool to deploy e-governance throughout the country. The Government of Punjab is all set to expand its mobile governance in an attempt to provide unparalleled services in various government departments.

The concept of mobile governance revolves around a centralized database with digital data sharing with services monitoring systems functioning via smartphones and apps in various public departments.

Government of Punjab has already used mobile governance to improve its education, health, police and various other departments. The most high profile use of mobile governance was seen when the health department was finding it difficult to combat and detect the outbreak of dengue virus in the province.

Through the use of mobile governance anyone with a smartphone and an authorized application could take a picture of an area contributing to the growth of dengue virus and upload it to the main server.

Relevant authorities were then notified of this application on the main server along with the location of the affected neighbourhood on the digital map of the area. The area would only be labeled “OK” when related officials go there and upload a cleansed picture of the neighbourhood.

Through this method the health department was not only able combat the dengue virus, but was also able to gather useful data on the virus for future use as well.

A similar project for are also running to mark attendance of teachers at public schools in order to ensure that the children of public schools receive the education they deserve. Specialized applications are also being developed to curb the bribery culture flourishing in our public departments; especially at the lower levels of administration.

With over 130 million cellular service subscribers in the country and a considerable number of highly professional and competent app developers operating in the country, the government has very little to do. All that needs to be done is providing a platform for all the right individuals to come together.

According to the Punjab Information Technology Board (PITB) the World Bank is willing to invest in their mobile governance project based on the successful results of the past. While this is all well and good, this model needs to be spread throughout the nation.

It will be unfair to restrict this model to just one province. The government must ensure that this mobile governance model is also implemented in all other provinces. We all know very well that perhaps Pakistan’s other three provinces require such mobile governance even more than Punjab.

Hopefully officials from the Government of Punjab with good experience in the field of mobile governance will also undertake the responsibility to share their knowledge and expertise with officials of other provinces as well.

 

[Asian.Century]

very interesting....

'Data science is particularly important to the Pakistani market place,' says CTO, Teradata

BR Research recently sat down with Stephen Brobst, the Chief Technological Officer for Teradata to discuss the science of big data and other tech developments. He is widely regarded as a leading expert in data warehousing and joined the Teradata team in October, 1999. He has served as an advisor to the National Academy of Sciences in the area of IT workforce development and also served in Barack Obama's first term as a member of the President's Innovation and Technology Advisory Committee (PITAC), a working group of the President and Council of Advisors on Science and Technology (PCAST).

BR Research: Please tell us about your role at Teradata and what the company is all about.

Stephen Brobst: As the Chief Technology Officer (CTO) at Teradata, I have responsibility for the technology strategy and the deployment of the technology solutions in the field globally for the company. In Pakistan, we have our local customers and our local teams, but we also have a global development center. Actually we have two of them, one in Lahore and one in Islamabad, which we use to create talent pools that serve globally and not just Pakistani customers. Of course, Pakistani customers benefit from that also because a lot of expertise is brought here from international experience, but for us it's a business model that works very well because we have talented enthusiastic people that are happy to travel when they are required to and deliver effective solutions that we need.

The Lahore facility for the global development center (GDC) is relatively new. We have the one in Islamabad for quite some time now, and recently we opened in Lahore to expand the capability; and we continue to hire in Lahore. Currently, the GDC at Lahore is roughly half the size of Islamabad, but it's growing faster. It is a good place to get and retain talent as there are a lot of universities here.

BRR: How long have you been operating in Pakistan and what sectors are working in?

SB: In 1999, the Teradata division was formed under NCR. Teradata came in to a Pakistan around 1999, and the first customer we had was NADRA. Then later we expanded in to mainly telecommunication companies like Ufone. Today all of the telecommunication companies in Pakistan are doing business with Teradata. We then expanded from telecommunications into financial services, which is strong in all the three major cities. Karachi does not have much telecommunications, but there is a lot of banking in Karachi and we also have some banks in Islamabad and Lahore as well. The third area we focus on is government with initially the federal government, but we have actually been working with the provincial government here in Punjab quite significantly as well in a number different efforts related to crime prevention, health care, tax compliance and other areas give a lot of value. We are also working with PIA as well as in the manufacturing sector.

BRR: What sort of services do you provide to the telecom and banking sector? Is it data warehousing or big data analytics or a combination of those?

SB: It is a combination of things; so we obviously provide data warehouse platform, which is the technology that they use to deploy the analytics. We provide them human resource and talent to develop their analytics and do their implementation. We have analytical customer relationship management (CRM) and software analytical applications that are used by many of the telcos for doing event-based marketing, targeting and segmentation and those kinds of things. Then we have the data model, which has been implemented widely in Pakistan for telecommunication companies, both for fixed and mobile business.

BRR: What kind of projects are you doing with the Government?

SB: There are number of projects related to law enforcement and safety. We have done some work in health care especially related to dengue fever tracking and prevention. Although some projects were commercial based, many of the projects are being done as part of our CSR initiatives.

BRR: Tell us about big data. What prospects do you see for big data in Pakistan and do you see any progress being made in this sector in Pakistan?

SB: Big data is bit of a hyped term. People are confused by this term. It's really not the bigness of the data that matters but the diversity of the data that really matters. We should call it diverse data not big data, but the term has become prevalent and I predict very soon we will stop using it. It was important initially in differentiating a new kind of data, but now the distinction is so apparent the term does not actually need to be used. For example, nowadays smart phones have become so common that people have stopped calling them smartphones. They just call it a mobile phone.

So I think the same thing will happen with big data, it will just be data. You don't care if its big data or small data or triangular or square data, it's just data. The main idea is how we exploit the content and diverse data sets regardless of what we call it.

If we look at big data exploitation there are three phases that are easily identifiable. The first phase, which is already history by now, is web logged data; it's not just what people buy online but every click and every search that lead up to the buy.

Pakistan is not a very strong player in online retailing so the companies who serve Pakistan are collecting and analysing that data, but it's not happening within Pakistan that much. On the other hand, online banking is something that they are definitely interested in analysing. Also, for airline companies, it is useful to analyse online booking and airline flights that people are looking at along with their purchasing patterns and finding out who's the looker and who's the booker is very interesting. So the web logged data that gives you the interaction below the level of the transaction is the first phase of big data exploitation. I think Pakistan is starting to look at that level of detail for certain industries.

The next stage of big data exploitation is social media: What are people saying about my brand, my products and my competitors and so on. In Pakistan that is probably most interesting to the telcos and the banks which are our main customers. The government is also interested in this to some extent as well because they want to understand which programs are working well and which aren't and what is on the minds of citizens. So in this scenario, there is a lot of interest, but the exploitation is relatively in its earlier stages.

The third phase really has not been widely adopted in the market place yet. I would say the third phase is sensor data. Being able to track every vehicle, every part in the supply chain, every item on the retail shelf; this is not really happening in Pakistan yet. The sensor isn't here yet but it will be eventually. One of our customers for example, Volvo cars whose brand is all about safety, uses sensors to increase the safety of the vehicle. They have made a commitment to the market place that by 2020 no one will die in a Volvo car, which is a pretty big deal. Sensors will eventually be everywhere from manufacturing to home applications. You can use sensors in your home for automatically monitoring the temperature and the lightning which is the concept of a smart home. This may seem like science fiction to you here, but for example in California building smart homes are emerging common practices.

However, even here a lot interesting things are going on and we have had some very interesting conversations with the Karachi electric utility company (K-Electric) for a smart grid and smart meters, which is a form of sensor technology to manage capacity more effectively.

BRR: What do you think is the time frame for sensor technology to become the new norm?

SB: It depends on the industry so in industries like the electric utilities. I think that's going to be in the next 3 years, would be my guess. Utilities are interesting because they are typically government granted monopolies, so the incentive to intervene is typically not so high. But because of energy shortages and rising energy costs, there is a lot of motivation to be smarter about energy which is why you see the adoption even though there is lack of competition. I would say with in Europe and US it's largely already a norm but soon it will come to Pakistan as well.

BRR: Where do you feel Pakistan stands in terms of technological competitiveness compared to its peers like India, Bangladesh and Sri Lanka?

SB: That again depends on the industry. Telecommunication in Pakistan is extremely competitive so I would say that Pakistan is at a global best practices level. So I'm not talking about comparing just India and Sri Lanka, I mean really at a global level. I think Pakistan is above the level of your near neighbours that you just mentioned. For example, Telenor Pakistan has been awarded international prizes for best practices not just regional but international level. So you definitely see that innovation thrives where competition is greatest. There is a lot of competition in that particular market place in Pakistan. There has been early investment and very sophisticated use of technology.

When it comes to the masses, I would say there is definitely somewhat of a lag in adoption and its disproportional rite in Pakistan. There are people who have less opportunity, so obviously it creates a digital divide that is larger here compared to other developed countries. I think that there are some government programs to help provide access to technology, for example, internet access but it takes time and money, and both of those are not easy.

BRR: You talked about E-commerce and online retailing. There is no comprehensive e-payment system in Pakistan currently. What do you think are the reasons why we don't have an e-payment system in Pakistan?

SB: I think a lot of that has to do with political and regulatory constraints. For coming in to a country, Pakistan in particular, you are going to banking; it's a lot of regulatory and government hoops that you have to jump through, which takes time. Additionally, companies evaluate the market place to gauge if there is readiness for adoption of new technology. For there to be demand for e-payments you want to assume that people have credit cards, smart phones and at least access to a laptop or desktop and technological penetration in Pakistan is not as ready as it is in other countries. So investors and companies go where the money is.

BRR: We have been hearing about the Internet of Things (IoT) as the next big thing. Can you please tell our readers in simple term how it can be beneficial for them?

SB: IOT is just another marketing term for sensors everywhere. So IOT is really about sensor technology. So you have consumer IOT, which is smart homes and smart vehicles. Then we also have industrial IOT, which is more in manufacturing like when to do maintenance on machines and measuring quality at the products that you have produced. IOT will go through different phases of maturity in terms of relatively simple sensor data analytics to much more sophisticated interaction between things.

The initial IOT is not in fact really IOT. It is the intranet of things, not the internet of things because most people companies at least from the industrial internet of things point of view are initially using the sensor data only within their own company. I would call that the intranet of things not the internet of things. But then once they have produced a product and put it out in the field and then it is collecting data and delivering it back to the company, which allows them to do maintenance on the field of the product, that they have manufactured is what will be the internet of things.

BRR: So big data is mostly for big firms. But in Pakistan 90 percent of the firms are small and medium enterprises (SMEs). Does Teradata have a strategy to focus on emerging market SMEs such as those in Pakistan?

SB: So we have versions of Teradata that you can deploy in a public cloud so most of the small companies prefer a cloud solution not an on premises solution. So a big company typically has a lot of data gravity in their data centers allowing them to perform data analytics. SMEs are much more attracted to the cloud type of model. So we have released Teradata in Amazon cloud infrastructure earlier this year.

We will be releasing Microsoft Azure later this year, and Google cloud is planned for next year. So the answer is yes, we see that the small businesses are interested in a cloud type of model. An OPEX model instead of a CAPEX model in terms of funding. So we believe that Teradata will be adopted and we are already seeing that adoption take place in the market place for smaller sized businesses.

But you have to realise there's also a sales efficiency point of view. Small businesses can't afford a huge system, and we can't afford to have a sales force calling on people making small purchases. But if we can leverage the market penetration of say Microsoft Azure or Amazon web services, then of course that creates a different kind of sales model and efficiencies where it makes sense to go down to that market. The core of our revenue is still going to come from larger customers. More than 80 percent of IT related expenditure world-wide is spent by the top five hundred companies.

BRR: Can you give us an insight into which field holds the most promise when it comes to data analysis in Pakistan?

SB: So one of the areas which have great potential in Pakistan is in data science. Yes, we can do data warehousing, reporting and analysis, but increasingly there has been a focus on data science, which is different than business analysis. A business analyst is looking for an answer to a business question and Pakistani customers have been using our technology for a long time to do that.

Data science is doing more data R&D, and much more advanced exploration and visualisation type of work. In Pakistan, the talent here is being developed as part of a program we have invested in, which eventually will lead to more of adoption of data science techniques. We have support for open source technology, which is increasingly popular in Pakistan. We Aster data, which is a technology that allows you to do more advanced graph processing, social media analytics and more advanced type of data science work.

I think data science is particularly important to the Pakistani market place. It's still at early stages of adoption but growing quickly so that is an area you want to look at particularly in financial services, telcos and the government sector as w


http://www.brecorder.com/br-researc...rket-place-says-cto-teradata/?date=2016-08-01

Source: https://defence.pk/threads/pakistan...on-and-technology.206783/page-5#ixzz4IUYpavBE

 

[faaiq Sheikh]

Innovation, technology can boost Pakistan’s exports: WB report
Pakistan and its South Asian neighbours could become the fastest growing exporting region of the world if authorities implement a set of policy actions aimed at improving the business environment, leveraging clusters, and strengthening firm capabilities, says a new World Bank report – South Asia’s Turn: Policies to Boost Competitiveness and Create the Next Export Powerhouse.

The report argues that increasing productivity of firms is the only sustainable path in improving competitiveness. Today, a broad set of constraints limit the growth and export potential of Pakistani firms vis-à-vis their competitors in East Asia and the rest of the world. In order to address these, the report highlights the well-known challenges in the region’s investment climate, but more importantly draws attention to the role of cities and clusters, global value chains, and firms’ abilities to innovate and efficient use of resources, including technology.

The region’s great potential to boost its competitiveness is evidenced through a number of examples in the report, ranging from the highly successful apparel industries in Bangladesh and Sri Lanka to Pakistan’s light manufacturing cluster in Sialkot which has achieved dominant global market shares in products such as soccer balls and surgical instruments.

“Pakistan, in particular, has important strategic endowments and development potential”, says Illango Patchamuthu, World Bank’s country director for Pakistan.

Pakistan leads many global competitors when it comes to wage competitiveness and proximity to key markets yet continues to experience weakening in exports competitiveness. Exports remain concentrated in the textiles and food sectors and investment in global value chain capabilities including capital, human capital, institutions and logistics remain limited.

“The region has a significant untapped potential in raising productivity through development of urban ecosystems providing thick markets for skilled labor, large tracts of industrial land, and world class logistics,” says Vincent Palmade, the report’s co-author.

With the right set of productivity-enhancing policies, South Asia could more than triple its share in global markets of electronics and motor vehicles and come close to doubling its already significant market share in apparel (excluding textiles and leather) by 2030.

To achieve that progress, South Asian countries, Pakistan in particular, must do well to improve their business environment. As acknowledged in the recent World Bank’s Doing Business report, the implementation of needed reforms is gaining momentum, and needs to be accelerated. Pakistan should also leverage the benefits of its cities clusters by actively mitigating congestion forces and facilitating access to industrial land.

Expanded participation in global value chains to markets through improvements in trade policies, logistics, and skills will also be beneficial. The report also calls for helping firms innovate, improve their managerial capabilities, and use technology to better connect with customers and suppliers for boosting competitiveness.

 

[Hafiz-Zafar]

Govt to spend Rs4.6b on IT projects
ISLAMABAD: The government plans to spend Rs4.6 billion on information technology (IT) projects during the fiscal year 2012-13 with emphasis on strengthening e-government, human resource and infrastructure development. There are 43 projects which are being executed in the sector with a total cost of Rs22.9 billion, an official at the Ministry of Information Technology and Communications said on Wednesday.

The official said that in order to achieve strategic objectives and enhance economic growth, policy reforms are envisaged which include maximum internet penetration – at least up to tehsil level – so that students, businesses, research institutions and commerce can benefit from IT.

Private entities are being encouraged to put information online with the guidance of provincial governments, the official said adding that all data obtained by remote sensing satellite of Pakistan Space and Upper Atmosphere Research Commission and surveys carried out by the Agriculture Departments and Crop Reporting Services (CRS) is being integrated into one central agricultural productivity website. He said that this will help develop fair food policies for rice, sugar, cotton, wheat for next season.

The individual local markets (mandis) selling agricultural produce will be linked through the website in order to apprise the traders and government of current prices of various products and help deal with situations of surpluses and deficiencies. The government policies of agriculture ministry and Trade Commission of Pakistan will also be based on feedback from this website.

Moreover, for enhanced software exports and to safeguard the interest of smaller software developer, the government will move them into viable clusters in software parks where these small development companies can manage larger IT development projects mutually. The software houses should operate as small industrial cities on the same lines as textile or garments cities, where uninterrupted electricity and broadband internet may be provided by government. He said that computerisation of revenue records is being implemented in all districts of Punjab.

Pakistan has progressed a lot in IT sector in the last 5 years or so. More and more students are choosing IT as their careers. Pakistanis have created some of the finest web and mobile applications. E-commerce industry has got boost and online shopping and earning through the internet have become a norm.

 

[xyxmt]

FAKE NEWS:

LinkedIn refuted the claims of a story filed by the state-owned wire service Associated Press of Pakistan (APP), which quoted the Board of Investment (BOI) Chairman Saleem Mandviwalla saying that Linkedin was planning to establish its offices in Pakistan and invest $10 million by the end of 2012 or the beginning of 2013.
“While we are exploring some commercial opportunities in Pakistan, we currently have no plans to open a local office,” LinkedIn spokesperson Darain Faraz told The Express Tribune.


LinkedIn denies plans to enter Pakistan – The Express Tribune

https://pk.linkedin.com/

Do you have any official declaration link of this post ?

Yes, Pakistan Bangla desh India, and Now nepal too every one growing in IT.

https://pk.linkedin.com/

 

[Hafiz-Zafar]

Extremely interesting & useful information. The contributors are doing wonderful job.

 

[Sadia.Anwar]

The technology in Pakistan is really working in a positive way. There is an escalation in the developed web solutions in this country. aarz.pk is the best example.

 

[Dr Shaheryar]

Was talking to one of my friends who is in insurance company in canada. He told me that IT solution used by the company are way backward. Same company in Pakistan has way better IT solution and data management. The Company is Forbes 100 listed company.

 

[Ahsan abbas12]

Assalam o alaikum.
Dear your topic is so much interested.
Your post is beneficiqal and Informative.....
Jazak Allah

 

[Thorough Pro]

Pakistan is living in a stone age when it comes to IT, watch this to judge for yourself

Information technology in Pakistan is a growing and rising industry that has a large potential. Matters relating to the IT industry are overseen and regulated by the Ministry of Information Technology of the Government of Pakistan. The IT industry is regarded as a successful sector of Pakistan economically, even in financial crisis.[3] The government of Pakistan has given numerous favors to IT investors in the country since last decade, that resulted in the development of the IT sector. In the years 2003-2005 the country's IT exports saw a rise of about fifty percent and amounted a total of about 48.5 million USD. The World Economic Forum, assessing the development of Information and Communication Technology in the country ranked Pakistan 102nd among 144 countries in the Global Information Technology report of 2012.

As of 2011, Pakistan has over 20 million internet users and is ranked as one of the top countries that have registered a high growth rate in internet penetration. Overall, it has the 15th largest population of internet users in the world. In the fiscal year 2012-2013, the Government of Pakistan aims to spend Rs. 4.6 billion on information technology projects, with emphasis on e-government, human resource and infrastructure development.

"Among the Asians, Pakistanis are the smartest people in the world in Information Technology." - William Henry Bill Gates | Former Chairman and Cheif Software Architect of Microsoft.

TOP 50 WEBSITES OF PAKISTAN
JumpShare, a File Sharing Tool from Pakistan, Launched
JumpShare.com, an online file sharing tool that enables its users to drag and drop filesto share and view 150 types of file formats including photos, videos, documents, presentations, code, and countless other file types, has been launched.

JumpShare, a brainchild of Ghaus Iftikhar – a serial entrepreneur from Islamabad, remained under development for well over year and a half after which it was launched yesterday in Beta version.

JumpShare.com is built around an idea that shared files online should be viewed online, instead of downloading them to your desktop for just viewing them.

Unlike other countless file sharing service providers, with JumpShare users can drag and drop their files to be shared with their friends and co-workers. Who can in return view these files online to ultimately save time and to bypass the hassle of downloading respective software required to open these files types.

With JumpShare, you won’t be required to sign-up or anything. Simply go to the URL and start sharing files. JumpShare (through cookies) will remember the list of files you have shared with friends lately to allow you to re-share them at a later time.

Currently JumpShare allows maximum of 100MB single file to be shared with friends and maximum of 2GB for all the files uploaded by a single user. JumpShare said that they will increase this limit once users’ accounts in near future.