Technical Skills Needed In Today’s Computer Science And IT Industry

Prof Kumkum Garg Aug 28, 2018

According to the latest report from NASSCOM, the IT sector in the country may add 100,000 new jobs during Financial Year 2019. The stated goal is to reach a $1 trillion digital economy by 2022, for which we would need growth across all industries, established and new age companies, technology service companies, and product companies, consumer internet as well as more adoption of digital across an enterprise, government, and MSME in India. NASSCOM is now working with the government on reskilling IT professionals while improving employment opportunities, by preparing future workforce at colleges.

Today a computer science degree is considered a smart career move for students wanting to make an impact in their career. There is an increasing awareness that skill sets in CS and IT are becoming highly pervasive. These graduates have some of the highest starting salaries. There is thus a huge demand for bright graduates to help transform areas ranging from computer programming to data infrastructure, to web development cybersecurity. But if these students are interested in pursuing a career in computer science, it is important to stay up to date with the latest trends and skills required in this important field.

In the following sections, we look at some of the trends storming the tech industry today!

Artificial Intelligence and Robotics

The global robotics industry is forecast to be worth US$38 billion by 2018 and a large portion of this growth will be based on investments in Artificial Intelligence (AI) – ‘the study of how to make computers do what human beings routinely do today’. AI has had a major revival in the last decade or so. Three factors have been responsible for this: cheaper storage, availability of large amounts of data and faster computers. Tech giants like Facebook, Google and IBM are investing huge amounts of money and resources into AI research. Many real-world applications of the technology are being developed, hence there is no dearth of specialists required in this field.

Big Data Analytics

In 2012, the Harvard Business Review branded data science as the ‘sexiest job’ of the 21st century. Efforts to boost salaries and attract data science talents in this field are being made by every industry in this field. The availability of huge data sets, especially from social networking applications, has led industries from banking to healthcare, to use this data to personalize and improve their services. It is known that only about 1% of this voluminous data is relevant and hence newer and more efficient techniques are being researched into to process and render it useful.

Technology-assisted education

makes use of computers and software to assist education and/or training, from pre-school up to higher education levels. According to a report by KPMG, the size of India’s e-learning market is likely to grow to $1.96 billion, second only to the US, which is forecasted to exceed $48 billion by 2020. The use of Massively Open Online Courses (MOOCs) has all of a sudden seen a meteoric rise in Universities. Blended and Flipped learning is also on the rise. Personalized instruction is also possible now, for students with learning disabilities. Students can learn at their own pace and independently, and the teacher can devote more time to each individual. In India, it has a huge and promising potential, given a large number of young people available.

Cyber Security

According to a 2014 report, cybersecurity jobs in the US grew by 74% between 2007 and 2013 – more than twice the rate of IT jobs overall..” In this hyper-connected world, where everything – from banking to dating and from entertainment to government working– is done online, data protection is no longer optional, for either individuals or nations. An acute need is felt to “collaborate and explore partnerships that will help develop the best ways to bolster a country’s cybersecurity”. This is another area of computer science research and raises concerns about the shortfall in qualified graduates in it.

Bioinformatics

The Bioinformatics Market is expected to reach $12.8 billion by 2020. This involves the integration of computers, software tools, and databases in an effort to address biological questions, especially about genomics and proteomics. It is a major application of big data and builds enormous datasets of biological information for research purposes. It links big pharma and software companies and offers good job prospects for computer science researchers and graduates interested in biology, medical technology, pharmaceuticals and computer information science.

All the skills mentioned above, as also many others in IT and non-IT skill sectors, have to be identified and nurtured through the combined and concerted effort of the Government, academia, and industry. The policies and procedures for skill development and training, both theoretical and hands-on, have to be prioritized and efficiently implemented if our youngsters have to be gainfully employed.

In this regard, the newly launched Bhartiya Skill Development University (BSDU) at Jaipur, is the first purely skills University in the world. Its mission is ‘to create opportunities for skill development of Indian youth to make them globally employable’. As such it has started many undergraduate and postgraduate degree programmes in a diverse set of skill areas, ranging from Automotive, Carpentry, Construction, Electrical, Entrepreneurship, IT/Networking, Machine Learning & AI, Nursing, Office Automation, RAC, Renewable Energy, Manufacturing. Many more skill areas are being added every year.

BSDU follows the Swiss dual-system of training which mandates that every alternate semester, the student has to undertake an apprenticeship or hands-on training in the Industry. BSDU also follows the ‘one-student-one machine’ concept, so that every student has a machine exclusively for herself to work and experiment upon.

The Schools of IT & Networking and Machine Learning & AI at BSDU have programmes in IT & Networking skills and Machine Learning & AI skills, at the UG level and Embedded Systems & IoT skills at the PG level. A Ph.D. programme in IT skills is also underway. It is also intended to start similar programmes in 3D Printing skills, Telecom skills, PCB manufacturing skills and Robotic skills in the coming years.