The hardware companies are eagerly looking forward to the upcoming budget. Reflecting the common sentiment, they all are demanding some respite during this global slowdown.

According to Gautam Ghosh, Country Manager, ViewSonic Technologies India, "We expect some major reform announcements in this budget to boost the hardware segment in India. Revamping ICT spending in education and health segments will be a key indicator. Also, we need reduction in import duties of hardware products, and abolition of SAD. This will not only offer impetus to the business, but will make computing further accessible and exciting to the consumers."

Simulating Ghosh's comments and demanding some more stimulus packages from the government, Sridhar Reddy, Chairman and Managing Director, CtrlS Data Centers, said, "Given the current scenario, government can come out with special measures for the IT sector. Firstly, the government should accelerate spend on various activities like SWAN, data centers, national mission on education through ICT and mission mode e-Governance projects. More importantly, government should take steps to bring in certainty in the near-term. Banks, manufacturers, exporters and IT/ITES companies are postponing their expenditure due to the prevailing uncertainty, the expectation that government would come with further stimulus packages, etc."
 
Sharing one more view on budget expectations, Ramesh Vaswani, Executive Vice Chairman, Intex Technologies, said, "Digital divide needs to be addressed in various areas such as education, healthcare, farming inputs, e-Governance, etc, and this can be best done through special missions. Importantly, SAD has outlived its utility and needs to be abolished, and claiming procedure for SAD refund needs to be simplified. There are several irritants in the policies and procedures for payment of duties/taxes and claiming exemptions or refunds which need to be addressed."

Adding more to it, Munish Gupta, VP (Operations), GlobalLogic, added, "I would expect steps to stimulate the economy. From IT industry perspective, given the challenging environment that it is going through, it will be imperative to extend the STPI benefits for the next few years."

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