Businesses in India are making major investments in digital technologies to support ambitious expansion plans after learning the lessons of the pandemic. New results from Equinix, Inc.’s annual survey of technology decision-makers suggest that 96% of IT leaders in India said their organization plans to expand into new markets over the next 12 months. A majority (67%) of those planning to expand said they would be most likely to support it by deploying virtually in the short term and then building permanent physical infrastructure when needed.

The pandemic continues to have a significant impact on Indian companies’ digital strategies, with 63% of respondents saying their IT strategy has become more aggressive and ambitious as a result of the pandemic. In fact, 65% confirm that their IT budgets have increased as a direct result of legacy – a glimpse into the now-recognized need for a resilient digital infrastructure that instantly adapts to changing business needs. Additionally, a majority of respondents (63%) believed that the technological changes and investments implemented during the pandemic will last.

More than half of Indian companies (57%) surveyed for the Equinix 2022 Global Tech Trends Survey see a significant positive business impact from a strong 5G network to embrace emerging technologies such as artificial intelligence (AI) and the Internet of Things to use (Internet of Things). At the same time, almost half of them (43%) recognized the need to redesign their IT infrastructure to ensure it supports 5G capabilities. Regarding the three-year technology strategy of Indian companies, 5G network infrastructure is seen as the most important (44%), followed by IoT applications (34%) and edge computing (32%).

Meanwhile, 65% of respondents in India said they expect to spend more on carrier-neutral colocation solutions, while 71% said they intend to increase investment in connectivity services to increase connectivity speeds and reduce latency reduce (53%), increase connectivity flexibility (51%) and improve network optimization (50%).

On the other hand, Indian IT decision-makers also identified a number of potentially limiting factors related to business success, with cyber-attacks highlighted as a particular concern (78%). Additionally, 76% faced challenges working with more complex digital supply chains, and 76% cited global issues and supply chain bottlenecks as top threats to their business. These ongoing supply chain issues appear to be fueling a need for more virtualization, with growth aspirations being underpinned by significant planned investments in digital infrastructure.

In addition, the survey found that in India:

·Web development 3: A majority of Indian IT leaders (52%) expect Web 3 to replace Web 2 within the next 1-5 years. 79% of respondents say their organization already has a Web 3 strategy in place.

·Cloud migration continues: 40% of IT leaders in India use public clouds, while 93% of them reported working with two or more cloud providers. 86% of Indian IT leaders said they are moving more business functions to the cloud. Of these respondents, 79% plan to move their security functions to the cloud and 60% plan to move databases to the cloud.

·Focus on hiring talent from small towns: The technology landscape in India is experiencing a war for talent. 95% of Indian IT leaders said there are opportunities to hire in smaller cities in India to unlock new talent pools.

·Focus on sustainability: When it comes to innovation, digital leaders keep a close eye on the sustainability of their IT infrastructure. In India, 85% said they have committed to science-based targets, while 84% said their customers want to know they are taking steps to reduce the carbon footprint of their IT infrastructure.