Software industry developmental trends in Sri Lanka

Abstract

Software industry is a growing industry in Sri Lanka in the recent decades. It brings more foreign currency to Sri Lanka and provides more employment opportunities to the graduates who pass out from universities. As Sri Lanka has a highly skilled and talented workforce, Sri Lankan software companies would be able to compete with the global software companies to provide sophisticated software products necessary for the global market. That is, the development of the software industry would be able to bring more benefits to the Sri Lankan economy. This research investigates the software industry developmental trends in Sri Lanka. There are five independent variables, three intervening variables and one dependent variable identified in the context. They are namely: software industry related investments, software industry related recruitments, the number of students passed out from universities, software policy, domestic software industry development, revenue earned from software exports, economic conditions of the country, global software industry constraints and software industry development. Considering some of the relationships between these variables three hypothesis were developed to predict the future of the software industry in Sri Lanka. Also, statistical data analysis using SPSS and Minitab software packages was used to forecast the development of software industry related investments, software industry related recruitments and the number of ICT graduates passed out from universities. This was useful in determining the development of the factors that affected in developing the software industry in Sri Lanka. According to the research, there would be a higher development in software industry in Sri Lanka in the future. Therefore, the government of Sri Lanka should plan for the future of the software industry focusing the factors that have mainly affected in developing the software industry.