Telangana plans T-Hub Phase-II with Rs 150-cr outlay

Governor Narasimhan, Ratan Tata to inaugurate T-Hub's Catalyst building on November 5

The Telangana government is planning to come up with the second phase of T-Hub, its public-private-partnership (PPP) initiative to support technology-enabled startups, involving an investment of Rs 150 crore, according to state IT and Panchayat Raj minister K T Rama Rao.

"T-Hub's Phase-II, with an incubation space of 300,000 sq ft, will be created within the 15 acre that has already been earmarked for the proposed games park at Raidurgam near Hitec City. We are weighing various options, including the PPP mode, to take it forward. The Phase-II is expected to be operational within the next three years," he told mediapersons on Monday.

The first phase of T-Hub, a 70,000-sft building called Catalyst created on the IIIT-Hyderabad campus, would be inaugurated by Telangana and Andhra Pradesh governor ESL Narasimhan and Tata Sons chairman emeritus Ratan Tata on November 5.

"While the Telangana government has invested Rs 40 crore in T-Hub's first phase, we are planning to reach out to the Centre to extend financial support for Phase-II," Rao said.

T-Hub, a collaborative effort by the Telangana government and academic institutions IIIT-Hyderabad, Indian School of Business and Nalsar, is aimed at catering not only to local entrepreneurs but also act as a gateway for Indian startups to access foreign markets and the other way round. The state IT Ministry is currently engaged in discussion to rope in University of Texas, Houston, MIT Media Lab and Spanish startup incubator Incubio.

The Telangana government, which is also slated to unveil its innovation policy on November 5, has already put in Rs 10 crore to T-Hub's initial seed fund of Rs 100 crore, with the remaining was contributed by various angel, seed, venture capital (VC) and private equity (PE) firms. "The intent is not to be content with Rs 100 crore. We are looking at increasing the corpus fund to $100 million over a period of time," the minister said.

Stating that T-Hub would be a free-spirited organisation with no government intervention, Rao said while 140 startups had already been selected for incubation, around 170 more were in the pipeline. "We want to give wings to entrepreneurs' dreams."

According to Rao, the government was mulling generating revenues by leasing deskspace and cabins to startups at T-Hub. "The idea is to create a self-sustainable vehicle," he said, adding that the returns that they were expecting was creation of employment and wealth for the startup state.