Pakistan’s IT Exports Set to Hit $4 Billion in FY25

Muhammad Umair Nizam, Senior Vice Chairman of Pakistan Software Houses Association (P@SHA), has apprised that information technology has become the fastest-growing export industry of Pakistan – and the country is set to achieve $4 billion in its IT exports for FY25; i.e., July 2024 – June 2025. Whereas it was $3.2 billion in FY24, we are optimistic for a 25 percent year-on-year (YoY) growth, he added. It is pertinent to note that P@SHA organized a high-profile interactive CXO session of the country’s top IT companies in Karachi to discuss and consult on the trends in Pakistan’s IT exports, its challenges, infrastructural growth, governmental relations, international collaborations, and investments. CEOs and other senior executives of the exporting companies participated in the strategic discussions in large numbers. Notably, Raheel Iqbal, Vice Chairman P@SHA; Haris Naseer, Treasurer P@SHA; Munaf Majeed, Usman Akbar, Hassan Bin Rizwan, Central Executive Committee (CEC) Members of P@SHA, attended the session. Umair Nizam informed that the IT industry as a whole expressed their satisfaction with the initiatives of the Prime Minister’s Office (PMO); the Ministry of Information Technology & Telecom (MoITT); the Special Investment Facilitation Council (SIFC); and the Pakistan Software Export Board (PSEB). Nonetheless, they demanded that the Federal Board of Revenue (FBR) and the State Bank of Pakistan (SBP) need to expedite their policymaking, regulatory easing, and implementation for an enabling, facilitative, and incentivizing environment to match the rate of expansion in the IT and IT-enabled Services (ITeS) industry. Nizam explained that the country is fast expanding in new sub-sectors and verticals in various tech spheres – and conventional regulations create bottlenecks due to their inability to adapt, he added. Nonetheless, the IT industry demanded a pro-investment and pro-business Federal Budget 2025–26, which is expected to be announced in the first week of June 2025. For which, P@SHA has submitted its detailed and data-driven budgetary proposals to the concerned ministries and institutions, Umair Nizam added. Primarily, P@SHA is looking forward to a 10-year tax holiday to encourage new foreign and domestic investments; streamlining of foreign exchange regulations; facilitation from commercial banks; removal of sales tax anomalies; allocation of funds for skills development; and acceleration of the operational materialization of Special Technology Zones (STZs) and IT parks. Umair Nizam highlighted that one of the critical demands of the IT companies is the parity and economic sense in the income tax applied to their salaried employees and the freelancers working in the country. Salaried employees have to pay up to 35 percent taxes, and freelancers pay only 0.25–1 percent. This is a glaring anomaly; it discourages salaried employees and needs to be fixed in the budget, he added. Muhammad Zohaib Khan, immediate past Chairman P@SHA, elaborated that IT is the only industry in Pakistan with an industry trade surplus in the vicinity of 75 percent – and it is the only industry which can grow at an exponential rate, develop a skilled workforce and create employment rapidly, help curtail the trade deficit, and keep current and external accounts healthy on a sustainable basis.