Hyderabad, April 30: Chief Minister K Rosaiah today urged officials of the Information Technology and Communications Department officials to expedite the development of the IT sector in Tier-2 cities in the State.
At a review meeting on the IT sector at the Secretariat today, the chief minister was apprised that as of today the State accounted for 15 per cent of national IT exports (compared to 8.63 per cent in 2004).
Andhra Pradesh ranked 4th in the country, after Karnataka, Maharashtra and Tamil Nadu, in that order.
Visakhapatnam was now emerging as the next IT Hub in the State.
The sector, he was told, made up 49 per cent of total exports from the State.
Companies like HSBC, Mahindra Satyam, Kenexa and IBM Daksh were now operating from Vizag. The IT sector aimed to achieve an export turnover of Rs 70,000 crore by 2015, creating 1.25 lakh direct jobs.
Roadshows and networking would be taken up to attract MNCs that had a presence in India but not in Hyderabad, and to motivate the IT majors in Hyderabad to expand to Tier-2 locations like Warangal, Vijayawada, Vizag, Kakinada and Tirupati.
It also aimed to promote new verticals like electronic hardware, animation & gaming, and engineering services through an attractive package of incentives.
Start-up SMEs were to be encouraged through special facilities and “incubation centres’’ to attract investments in the IT SE Zs. The IT&C department was looking to provide incentives such as stamp duty reimbursement, power subsidy, exhibition subsidy, quality certification, recruitment assistance and “provision of infrastructure at the doorstep’’.
It would provide a special and negotiable package of incentives for promotion of Tier-2 locations — land at concessional rates, stamp duty reimbursement (onetime), anchor company subsidy or/and recruitment assistance, training assistance, power subsidy (25 per cent for 3 years).
The chief minister has agreed to inaugurate an incubation centre — SOLITAIRE at Madhapur, and to lay the foundation stone for the Kokapet IT SEZ. He will also lay foundation stones for the development of IT SEZs at Warangal, Gambheeram in Vizag, and the Tirupati incubation centre and IT SEZ.
IT Minister K Venkat Reddy and officials attended the meeting.
–Agencies