Pune is coming up as a paradise for start-up companies and may be emerging as Asia's innovation hub. It has 124 software product start-up companies, 112 top global R&D centres, talent pool of 24000 people engaged in various projects, 17 SEZs and IT parks, 18 IT-BPO SEZs and more than 40 engineering colleges.
Within the overall industry ecosystem, key areas of strength for Pune include BFSI IT services, automotive engineering and enterprise software product engineering.
Advisory firm Zinnov Management Consulting has released a comprehensive study titled 'Advantage Pune - The Innovation Frontier' that highlights the enormous potential Pune holds in becoming the next innovation hub of Asia.
According to the Zinnov-SEAP(software exporters' association Pune) study, Pune city has seen several inflection points over the last two centuries that have on Thursday resulted in a mature engineering ecosystem with many MNC and indigenous companies, world class universities, a large installed talent pool and thriving start-ups.
Talking about the study, Pari Natarajan, co-founder and CEO of Zinnov Management Consulting said, "We were always upbeat about Pune and its prospects. Pune has not only contributed to the growth of the state, but also to the overall IT growth of India. We are also seeing an explosive start-up ecosystem here, which is very unique to the city.
Pune houses close to 125 indigenous start ups with business and productivity software accounting for 50 per cent of it. In the years to come, the city can easily propel itself to the global league through some smart marketing efforts and creating a more vibrant 'Brand Pune'."
Commenting on this study, Gaurav Mehra, president, SEAP, said, "We are confident that Pune is on the path to becoming the next innovation hub of Asia. All the factors are conducive for growth and with some more push and efforts from the industry and government alike, there is no stopping it."
Stressing on Pune's education advantage, the study finds that while Pune has traditionally been a location of industrial engineering, it now produces a large and diversified pool of engineering graduates every year spanning IT, automobiles and finance.
Pune produces over 12,000 engineering graduates every year and it is expected to further increase as more colleges come up. Add to this the many institutes which offer market oriented vocational training courses like hotel management, gemology and jewellry designing.
Pune has traditionally been the engineering base for some of the largest Indian engineering and technology companies namely Bajaj Auto, Kirloskar Electric Company, Bharat Forge, Tata Motors, Kinetic India, Thermax India, KPIT Cummins and the like.
The city also has the highest number of micro, small and medium enterprises (MSMEs) and large-scale units in the state. The district accounts for 49.7 per cent of MSME units and 50.5 per cent of large-scale units in Maharashtra, which goes on to show the engineering and R&D prowess of Pune.
"Pune was the birthplace of outsourcing in India. The city's close proximity to the financial capital of India too has been a boon as a lot of companies in the BFSI space have established a shared services base in Pune. This is in addition to the traditional strength of Pune in core engineering R&D and manufacturing" added Bhavani Shankar, Manager, Zinnov Management Consulting.
Pune also needs to further improve the perception of the city in terms of its cosmopolitan nature to encourage highly skilled workforce from all over India to come and work here.
And lastly, the city must improve its infrastructure and attract investments in its key areas of strengths namely BFSI IT Services, Automotive Engineering and Enterprise Software, it added.
