‘Foreign tech majors to announce deals during investors’ meet’

Close on the heels of his recent visits to Singapore and the United States to attract investments to Tamil Nadu ahead of the January 2019 Global Investors’ Meet (GIM), Information Technology Minister M. Manikandan said on Tuesday that at least 20 IT firms had pledged to announce investments to the tune of Rs. 25,000 crore during the summit.

Single-window clearance

Addressing mediapersons, Mr. Manikandan, who returned from the U.S. a few days ago, said several firms had evinced interest in investment opportunities in the State after he assured them of stamp duty concessions, incentives and hassle-free single-window clearance within 45 days for starting a business.

The firms which had evinced interest in investing in the State included Google, Austin, Amazon, Intel, Tesla, Ascendas and Ericsson, he said. Their investments are expected to provide employment to at least 10,000 people, the Minister added.

Projects

Mr. Manikandan said the first GIM, held in 2015 when Jayalalithaa was the Chief Minister, attracted investments worth Rs. 10,500 crore from the IT sector alone, and the projects of 17 investor firms were at varying stages of implementation.

During his visit to Singapore last month, he said he met representatives of Google and Ascendas, and they pledged investments to the tune of Rs. 5,000 crore.

Later, accompanied by IT department secretary Santosh Babu and ELCOT Managing Director M. Vijayakumar, the Minister visited several IT firms in Austin, Texas.

He said semiconductor company AMD gave an assurance that it will start a unit in Tamil Nadu. The delegation also visited the Austin Chamber of Commerce and the Austin Pacific Chamber of Commerce, and urged them to invest in Tamil Nadu. The team visited Intel’s headquarters in San Francisco, Ericsson, Flex, Facebook and Tesla in a bid to attract investments, the Minister said.

Mr. Manikandan said he addressed The IndUS Entrepreneurs (TiS) association, which comprised a large number of Non Resident Indians (NRIs), and the Tamil Mandram, and urged NRIs to invest in Tamil Nadu.

He said he had requested the Plug and Play Tech Centre and the Founder Institute in San Francisco to offer entrepreneurial training to budding entrepreneurs from Tamil Nadu and help them start enterprises here. This will go a long way in addressing the employment problem, he said.

Google, Amazon, Intel, Tesla, Ascendas and Ericsson are among the firms that have evinced interest