Information Technology in Sri Lanka refers to

business process outsourcing Outsourcing is an agreement in which one company hires another company to be responsible for a planned or existing activity which otherwise is or could be carried out internally, i.e. in-house, and sometimes involves transferring employees and ...

software development Software development is the process of conceiving, specifying, designing, programming, documenting, testing, and bug fixing involved in creating and maintaining applications, frameworks, or other software components. Software development invo ...

IT Services Information technology service management (ITSM) is the activities that are performed by an organization to design, build, deliver, operate and control information technology (IT) services offered to customers. Differing from more technology-or ...

, and IT education in

Sri Lanka Sri Lanka (, ; si, ශ්‍රී ලංකා, Śrī Laṅkā, translit-std=ISO (); ta, இலங்கை, Ilaṅkai, translit-std=ISO ()), formerly known as Ceylon and officially the Democratic Socialist Republic of Sri Lanka, is an ...

. Sri Lanka is always ranked among the top 50 outsourcing destinations by

AT Kearney Kearney is a global management consulting firm with offices in more than 40 countries worldwide. Kearney has consistently earned top places among global management consulting firm rankings, such as Vault's Consulting 50 and ''Consulting'' magazine' ...

, and

Colombo Colombo ( ; si, කොළඹ, translit=Koḷam̆ba, ; ta, கொழும்பு, translit=Koḻumpu, ) is the executive and judicial capital and largest city of Sri Lanka by population. According to the Brookings Institution, Colombo me ...

and ranked among "Top 20 Emerging Cities" by Global Services Magazine. The export revenue of this industry grew from USD 213 million in 2007 to USD 1089 million in 2019.

History

For the purpose of developing IT in Sri Lanka, Computer Society of Sri Lanka was started in 1976. Sri Lanka's IT, KPO/BPO industry has a short span of history starting around 2000. IT/BPO sector has been identified as a priority sector for economic development in the country.

Business process outsourcing

Sri Lanka is an

offshore development center Offshoring is the relocation of a business process from one country to another—typically an operational process, such as manufacturing, or supporting processes, such as accounting. Usually this refers to a company business, although state gover ...

and

Joint venture A joint venture (JV) is a business entity created by two or more parties, generally characterized by shared ownership, shared returns and risks, and shared governance. Companies typically pursue joint ventures for one of four reasons: to acces ...

hub for several

Fortune 500 The ''Fortune'' 500 is an annual list compiled and published by ''Fortune (magazine), Fortune'' magazine that ranks 500 of the largest United States Joint-stock company#Closely held corporations and publicly traded corporations, corporations by ...

companies from

North America North America is a continent in the Northern Hemisphere and almost entirely within the Western Hemisphere. It is bordered to the north by the Arctic Ocean, to the east by the Atlantic Ocean, to the southeast by South America and th ...

, UK,

Australia Australia, officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a sovereign country comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands. With an area of , Australia is the largest country by ...

Sweden Sweden, formally the Kingdom of Sweden,The United Nations Group of Experts on Geographical Names states that the country's formal name is the Kingdom of SwedenUNGEGN World Geographical Names, Sweden./ref> is a Nordic countries, Nordic c ...

Norway Norway, officially the Kingdom of Norway, is a Nordic countries, Nordic country in Northern Europe, the mainland territory of which comprises the western and northernmost portion of the Scandinavian Peninsula. The remote Arctic island of ...

and

Japan Japan ( ja, 日本, or , and formally , ''Nihonkoku'') is an island country in East Asia. It is situated in the northwest Pacific Ocean, and is bordered on the west by the Sea of Japan, while extending from the Sea of Okhotsk in the n ...

. Well known customers of Sri Lankan BPO industry include

Google Google LLC () is an American Multinational corporation, multinational technology company focusing on Search Engine, search engine technology, online advertising, cloud computing, software, computer software, quantum computing, e-commerce, ar ...

, J.P. Morgan & Co,

Microsoft Microsoft Corporation is an American multinational technology corporation producing computer software, consumer electronics, personal computers, and related services headquartered at the Microsoft Redmond campus located in Redmond, Washi ...

Emirates Emirates may refer to: * United Arab Emirates, a Middle Eastern country * Emirate, any territory ruled by an emir ** Gulf emirates, emirates located on the Persian Gulf ** Emirates of the United Arab Emirates, the individual emirates * The Emirat ...

Infor Infor is a multinational company headquartered in New York City that provides industry specific, enterprise software licensed for use on premises or as a service. , Infor's software had 58 million users, and 90,000 corporate customers in 2 ...

and

Qatar Airways Qatar Airways Company Q.C.S.C. ( ar, القطرية, ''al-Qaṭariya''), operating as Qatar Airways, is the state-owned flag carrier airline of Qatar. Headquartered in the Qatar Airways Tower in Doha, the airline operates a hub-and-spoke netwo ...

. Sri Lanka's BPO cost is 30% lower than other offshore destinations. Sri Lanka also won the ''Outsourcing Destination of the Year'' award by National Outsourcing Association.

Rankings

Government Bodies

The prominent government body related to IT in Sri Lanka is the

Ministry of Technology The Ministry of Technology was a department of the government of the United Kingdom, sometimes abbreviated as "MinTech". The Ministry of Technology was established by the incoming government of Harold Wilson in October 1964 as part of Wilson's am ...

. Other than that Ministries of Education, Skills development are working on developing the education while Ministry of Industry and Commerce is on industrial level activities.

Revenue Statistics

Legislation

IT in Sri Lanka is governed under the Information and Communication Technology Act No. 27 of 2003. Other Related Acts
Electronic Transactions Act, No. 19 OF 2006

National Digital Policy for Sri Lanka

Data Protection Bill

Telecommunication Levy Act
No. 21 OF 2011
Telecommunication Levy Act(Amendment)
Act, No. 8 OF 2013

Agencies

The Information and Communication Technology Agency (Sri Lanka)

Sri Lanka Computer Emergency Readiness Team
(SLCERT)
Telecommunications Regulatory Commission of Sri Lanka
(TRCSL)

Organisations

Sri Lanka Association of Software and Service Companies
(SLASSCOM) similar to India's

NASSCOM The National Association of Software and Service Companies (NASSCOM) is an Indian non-governmental trade association and advocacy group, focused mainly on the technology industry of India. Established in 1988, NASSCOM is a non-profit organis ...

is another agency working on the development of business, education and employment.
The Federation of Information Technology Industry Sri Lanka (FITIS)

The ICT Industry Skills Council (ICTISC)

Recent development

There are many global IT services companies established in Sri Lanka such as HSBC, IFS, Intel, Motorola, WNS,RR Donnelley, Virtusa, Pearsons and Accenture.

IT parks

Sri Lanka has few government owned and privately managed IT Parks. Orion City IT Park established in 2009 is a privately owned IT park situated in Dematagoda area in Colombo. The Park is spread over 16 acres and currently has 800,000 sq feet of developed space. Currently this park houses,

Virtusa Virtusa Corporation is an American information technology services company founded in 1996 in Sri Lanka and has its headquarters in Southborough, Massachusetts, United States. The company provides IT consulting, business consulting, systems imple ...

IFS AB IFS AB (Industrial and Financial Systems) is a multinational enterprise software company headquartered in Linköping, Sweden. The company develops and delivers enterprise software for customers worldwide who manufacture and distribute goods, m ...

WNS Global Services WNS (Holdings) Limited () is a global business process management company headquartered in Mumbai, India. The company has its expansion with 60 delivery centers worldwide. History WNS was founded in 1996 by British Airways as Speedwing World ...

and several other IT and non-IT companies. In 2011 a full featured IT park was proposed to be built at

Hambantota Hambantota ( si, හම්බන්තොට, ta, அம்பாந்தோட்டை) is the main town in Hambantota District, Southern Province, Sri LankaThe prominent Malays (මැලේ) most part of the population is to be partly de ...

as a government project. In 2012 this project was approved by the

Cabinet Cabinet or The Cabinet may refer to: Furniture * Cabinetry, a box-shaped piece of furniture with doors and/or drawers * Display cabinet, a piece of furniture with one or more transparent glass sheets or transparent polycarbonate sheets * Filin ...

. TRACE Expert City is a similar project, developed by the Urban Development Authority, working with the Ministry of Defense. It is situated in

Maradana Maradana is a suburb of Colombo, Sri Lanka. Maradana is the site of Maradana Railway Station, one of the primary railway hubs in the country, serving intercity rail and commuter rail. Maradana also has many railway yards and running sheds. A t ...

. In February 2016 India’s External Affairs Minister

Sushma Swaraj Sushma Swaraj () (''née'' Sharma; 14 February 1952 – 6 August 2019) was an Indian lawyer, politician, and diplomat who served as the Minister of External Affairs of India in the first Narendra Modi government from 2014 to 2019. She is only ...

announced that they are offering an IT park for Sri Lanka considering the IT industry's importance in the country.

Employment

According to the National ICT workforce Survey 2013, the positive domestic developments and gradual recovery of the global economic situation have created a conducive environment for growth of the industry’s workforce and the projection figure shows that this trend is likely to continue. The overall workforce has grown to 75,107 in 2013 with a projection. In 2013, 63% of the workforce held graduate or post-graduate level qualifications. The IT industry has become one of the largest sectors in producing employment opportunities in Sri Lanka by creating thousands of IT job openings. Notably, many foreign IT companies start production officers in Sri Lanka due to the wide availability high quality skilled resources and relatively low operational costs.

IT education

Secondary Education

In the national level curriculum, first computer related subject taught at public schools is Information and Communication Technology. This is an elective subject for

GCE Ordinary Level in Sri Lanka The Sri Lankan Ordinary Level (O-level) is a General Certificate of Education (GCE) qualification in Sri Lanka, conducted by the Department of Examinations of the Ministry of Education. It is based on the Cambridge University Ordinary Level qualifi ...

. For

GCE Advanced Level in Sri Lanka The Sri Lankan Advanced Level (A-level), is a General Certificate of Education (GCE) qualification exam in Sri Lanka, similar to the British Advanced Level, conducted annually by the Department of Examinations of the Ministry of Education. It is u ...

a compulsory subject and an exam called General Information Technology was introduced considering the need of IT literacy for every student. Under the technology stream introduced for GCE Advanced Level in past years a new main subject for IT, Information and Communication Technology is added.

Higher Education

With the rapid development of IT industry and increasing job demand in the 1990s, steps were taken by both government and private sector to improve the IT education across the country.

Criticism

CEPA Controversy

In 2016 January, the Sri Lankan government announced that Indo-Sri Lankan Comprehensive Economic Partnership Agreement between India and Sri Lanka will be finalized. It is assumed that Sri Lankan IT industry's job market will be opened to Indians by this agreement causing unemployment among Sri Lankans.

Future

Sri Lanka's IT industry's goal is to achieve USD 5 billion in exports by 2022 while creating 200,000 jobs and uplifting 1,000 tech start-ups. In 2012

Computer literacy Computer literacy is defined as the knowledge and ability to use computers and related technology efficiently, with skill levels ranging from elementary use to computer programming and advanced problem solving. Computer literacy can also refer ...

of Sri Lanka was 38%.

References

{{Economy of Sri Lanka