By IANS,
New Delhi : The global economic meltdown is not the only factor that is pulling down the revenues of Indian businesses. A study released here Wednesday said India Inc lost Rs.43,205 crore in 2008-09 due to power outages.
The study, jointly carried out by IT hardware industry body Manufacturers’ Association for Information Technology (MAIT) and US-based power distribution solutions provider Emerson Network Power, said the revenue loss due to power failure grew at an average of 11.9 percent in the past five years.
In 2003, this loss stood at Rs.22,000 crore.
“With significant companies relying on IT infrastructure for automation, productivity and business management, employee productivity and customer management were severely impacted by such downtime,” the study said.
In all, 800 firms in seven cities including Delhi, Pune, Bangalore and Mumbai across 14 industries participated in the survey.
“Contingency planning is part of the India Inc mindset, based on traditional experiences with infrastructure limitations. This trend will continue in the light of global power failures encountered in Western countries,” the report said.
Added MAIT executive director Vinnie Mehta: “Firms will need to pay more attention to maximizing uptime if they are to remain competitive in a globally networked economy.”
According to the study, power disruption frequency was highest in Delhi followed by Pune and Bangalore, while the average downtime cost was Rs.54,434 per hour.