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ELCOT drive to make Coimbatore an IT zone

COIMBATORE: In its bid to market Coimbatore as `the ideal IT destination', ELCOT has proposed to conduct `road shows' across the country and the globe soon.

Disclosing this here, Mr K. Gnanadesikan, Chairman and Managing Director, ELCOT said `there is a need to conduct an IT event every year to publicise Coimbatore'.

He said the establishment of The Indus Entrepreneurs (TIE) chapter here would help the Indian Diaspora come to know of Coimbatore. Stating that the city neither lacked technical man power availability nor a good infrastructure, he said, at this stage, it would be the ideal IT destination, compared to Chennai or Bangalore.

The ELCOT MD categorically stated that IT would witness a decentralised growth. Though there were about 500 IT companies in Chennai, just about 34 had set up their units in the Tidal Park and the rest either in their own building or elsewhere.

Ms P. Rajalakshmi, Director, Software Technology Parks of India (STPI) lamented that out of the 500-odd IT companies, hardly 10 or 15 were doing extremely well. Besides, a majority of these units is small and medium enterprises, she said, adding `STPI ha s started nurturing the companies in Chennai, and about 80 companies which were in the SME category about two years back have grown'.

She pointed out that secondary cities such as Tiruchi, Madurai, Tirunelveli etc., were emerging `IT centric'. -- Our Bureau