New Delhi, March 16: While several companies across the world have recommended work from home for their employees in the wake of global coronavirus outbreak, a report said many firms in India cannot extend this facility. According to Gartner, a leading IT service management company, 54 percent of the companies in India do not have required technology and resources for employees to work to home. PM Narendra Modi Welcomes Work From Home for Employees, Suspension of Business Travel, Suggests Minimising Social Outings Amid COVID-19 Outbreak.

While employees of IT companies can work from home with the help of video conferencing and other software, people at non-IT companies don't have advanced desktops and laptops, fast internet connectivity and USP backup. These employees have little or no clue about how messaging and sharing tools such as Zoom, Google Hangouts Meet, Microsoft Teams and Flock etc. Coronavirus Live Map: How to Track The Spread of COVID-19 Across The Globe.

"The value of digital channels, products and operations is immediately obvious to companies everywhere right now. This is a wake-up call for organisations that have placed too much focus on daily operational needs at the expense of investing in digital business and long-term resilience," warned Sandy Shen, Senior Director Analyst, Gartner. Businesses that can shift technology capacity and investments to digital platforms will mitigate the impact of the outbreak.

"Videoconferencing, messaging, collaboration tools and document sharing are just a few examples of technologies that facilitate remote work. Additional bandwidth and network capacity may also be needed, given the increasing number of users and volume of communications," Shen explained. According to Muneer Ahmad, Business Head, ViewSonic India, due to COVID-19 pandemic, the corporate and educational sector is severely getting affected in the country.

"ViewSonic IFP has a cloud-based software which help teachers and corporates to connect through video conferencing to multiple people at the same time and can split the screen into six screens. It can also connect with various tools like Skype, Cisco WebEx, Zoom, Google Hangouts and GoToMeeting," Ahmad told IANS. India has reported 114 cases of coronavirus so far.

(The above story first appeared on LatestLY on Mar 16, 2020 05:11 PM IST. For more news and updates on politics, world, sports, entertainment and lifestyle, log on to our website latestly.com).