Beyond Bengaluru: Karnataka To Decentralise Growth And Take Innovation, Tech Ecosystem To Tier II Cities

In these times when an organic shift of the workforce has taken place with virtual workspaces and work-from-home being reality for most people, especially those working in the IT/BT industry in silicon city, Karnataka plans to initiate the decentralisation of this industry in other cities of the state.

While for years, Bengaluru had been the only focus of investors as well as the government, a new initiative ‘Beyond Bengaluru’ has been launched as part of the Bengaluru Tech Summit yesterday (12 November) and seeks to take this ecosystem beyond the capital.

Deputy Chief Minister and Minister for IT,BT,S&T and Electronics Ashwatha Narayana inaugurated the initiative and said the move was aimed at “enhancing the growth of IT/ITes, Business Process Outsourcinf(BPO), Electronic System Design Manufacturing (ESDM) and Telecom sector industries located Mysuru, Mangaluru, Hubbali-Dharwad, Shivamogga, Belagavi and Gulbarga.

Narayana also added that the contribution of cities outside Bengaluru to the total revenue of the state was just five per cent and that this needed to be increased for the state to “achieve the target of becoming a trillion-dollar digital economy by 2025”.

A task force has also been established comprising of industry, academia and other stakeholder who will prepare a white paper for the same which will promise measures to be taken to develop this technology ecosystem.

The following incentives are being offered to those who intend to invest and take the industry beyond silicon city :

1. Financial support for Information Technology Hubs/ Clusters of up to Rs3 Crores

2. Financial support for Co-working Spaces/ Plug and Play Infrastructure of up to Rs 2 Crores

3. Lease/ Rental Reimbursement of up to Rs 3 lakhs (at the rate of Rs 10 per sqft.) or Rs 6 lakhs (at the rate of Rs 1000 per seat)

4. Exemption on Stamp Duty of 75 per cent in Mysuru, Hubballi, Dharwad and Mangaluru and 100 per cent for all other Zones

5. Applicability of Industrial Power Tariff instead of Commercial

6. Quality Certification Cost Reimbursement up to INR 6 lakhs outside Zone 4

• Marketing Cost Reimbursement of up to INR 5 lakhs per entity

• Reimbursement of PF/ESI at the rate of INR 2000 per employee per month for 2 years for all new employment created

• Patents Cost Reimbursement of INR 2 lakhs for Domestic and INR 10 lakhs for International Patent awarded and R&D Support of up to INR 1 crore.