In the swiftly changing world of innovation, we stand on the brink of a new era powered by revolutionary technologies set to transform every facet of our daily lives in the foreseeable future.

Today, the top four companies globally by market cap -- Apple, Microsoft, NVIDIA, and Alphabet (Google) -- are all IT giants with a combined market cap exceeding $12 trillion. Close behind are Meta (Facebook) at $1.5 trillion and Tesla at $800 billion, ranked seventh and twelfth, respectively. This shift indicates that manufacturing, pharmaceutical, and oil and gas companies, which demand substantial investments, are no longer the dominant leaders in the global market.

Pakistan’s IT industry is quite small, estimated to be just $3 billion in 2024. In contrast, IT exports from India, a country with only six times the population, amount to a staggering $200 billion. Despite having over 250 universities, more than 4000 IT certification institutes, producing over 20,000 IT graduates and engineers annually, and some of the lowest salaries globally, Pakistan has yet to make a significant impact globally in the IT sector.

What has gone wrong? We are aware of some of the issues: the poor quality of IT graduates, the difficulty of starting a business, and the lack of sufficient government incentives, such as affordable broadband internet, uninterrupted power supply, and flexible FBR policies. Pakistan needs to prioritize producing high-quality graduates, similar to those from India's IITs, rather than focusing on quantity. Hundreds of billions of rupees........

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