As part of its efforts to take the benefits of information technology to Tier-II and Tier-III cities, the Andhra Pradesh government has given its green signal to about 15 tech companies to set up shop in the state, which will lead to creation of 12,000 direct jobs over the next two to three years, according to IT&C principal secretary Ajay Mishra.
“Together, these small and medium-sized enterprises were allotted 26 acres. Of these, nine will set up base in Visakhapatnam, three in Kakinada, two in Tirupati and one in Warangal,” he said, while refusing to spell out the names of the IT companies and the investments that they would bring into the state.
Mishra was speaking to mediapersons on the sidelines of a CEOs roundtable session with Cisco Inc’s vice-president (corporate positioning) Ron Ricci organised by the Confederation of Indian Industry (CII) in Hyderabad on Friday.
The state government has been in the process of positioning Hyderabad as an IT destination over the last 10 years and its primary focus has been on attracting investments, which led to an uptick in IT exports and job creation, he said, adding that Andhra Pradesh now ranks third in terms of IT exports.
IT exports from Andhra Pradesh touched the $6.5-billion mark for the year ended March 31, 2009, an increase of 20 per cent over last year. The national growth rate during the 2008-09 financial year was at 13.5 per cent. Despite the downturn, direct employment in the IT sector in the state reached 2,29,000 last year, he said.
“In all, 69 new IT companies had registered with the state government and about 12 of them had started operations, contributing nearly Rs 1,000 crore to the IT exports from the state last year,” Mishra added.
