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By Sally Watson, 7 November 2000 15:00

NEWS With the technology industry in Western Europe facing a potential shortage of 1.7 million high-tech workers by 2003, according to IDC, companies are increasingly looking to Asia as a future source of talent. But Kaushik Reddy of Madras-based Sofil Information Systems, said India's high-tech workers still prefer to move to the US. "Most IT people think US and only US," he told silicon.com. "If we try to send them to our offices in Japan or Singapore they just leave." Bob Manning, deputy head of government investment agency invest.UK, admits it is hard to fight the lure of the States. "The perception is that the US is the place to be, but we're trying to promote the UK as well," he said. In September, Home Office minister Barbara Roche hinted at a relaxation of immigration rules for high-tech workers. "We are in competition for the brightest and best talents - the entrepreneurs, the scientists, the high technology specialists who make the global economy tick," she said. But the UK's efforts may not be attracting the skilled high-tech workers the industry so desperately needs. Even the expansion of Asian software firms into the UK won't bring in extra IT professionals. According to Reddy, networking and web specialist Sofil is planning to open a European HQ, but the move is unlikely to generate jobs for highly skilled workers. Colin Wood, executive director of business development at the London First Centre, which encourages investment into the capital, admits that most Indian companies are only looking at establishing sales operations in the UK, at least in the early stages. "The term 'development centre' is misleading," Wood claimed. "A lot of the actual development work is being done in India." Indian software giant Infosys has a development centre in Croydon, London. But worldwide head of sales and marketing Phaneesh Murthy admits not much programming work goes on there. "It doesn't make sense to do programming work in the developed world," he said.