Where IT all started

Where IT all started
The Hindu Business Line

Electronics City... the main IT hub of Bangalore and India.

It was the Electronics City that put Bangalore, dubbed India's Silicon Valley, on the world IT map. The State Government claims that there are two MNC investments in new operations every week, and this has certainly bred a `technopolis'. A concept that Bangalore started taking seriously in the early 1980s when the city started relying less on the fame of its then salubrious weather, huge public sector enterprises employing thousands of people and the institutions that lent it a technological sheen — the Indian Institute of Science, the Indian Space Research Organisation, etc.

But what Bangalore actually achieved is mind-boggling. Apart from the core IT businesses, the city also saw a startling change in its landscape with modern buildings and sleek interiors, as software majors insisted on international standards at workplaces. The real estate industry owes its phenomenal growth to the IT industry.

Bangalore expects to contribute $8.75 billion of the $22 billion expected from outsourcing revenues of the Indian IT industry and the sector continues to grow at a heady 30 per cent. IT jobs in Bangalore have overtaken the job market growth in Silicon Valley in the US; India has more than a million IT workers and top global IT service companies have indicated more recruitment from the country soon. Bangalore is sure to reap a rich harvest in this drive, as more IT workers move into the city. It all started in 1976 on a small piece of land — a little more than a square kilometre — on the Bangalore-Hosur National Highway (No 7), 18 km south of the city, when the Karnataka State Electronics Development Corporation established a new industrial park called Electronics City.

The facility was mainly occupied by public sector undertakings — the ITI being the biggest landowner, and import substitution — the national mantra then — being the largest activity.

Texas Instruments, which tied up with VSNL for maintaining its ground station equipment and got a 256 KBPS bandwidth link, was the city's first offshore software facility. Now Electronics City, which according to State Department is `fully infrastructure loaded,' boasts a biotechnology park (indication that the Government wants to make the city a biotech hub too) and is home to a host of Indian and multinational companies, including Wipro, Infosys, HP, IBM and Siemens.

Electronics City has over 145 companies that operate from the first and subsequent phases, and account for revenues of over Rs 6,000 crore; over 40,000 people work here. It has four business schools and a national information technology institute.

Infosys and Wipro employ about 17,000 and 13,000 people respectively in this location, while HP has over 7,500 employees here. Revenues are growing at 30-50 per cent for most companies and as domestic demand continues to grow, the future appears bright.

The construction of an elevated highway from the busy Silk Board junction to Electronics City; the second level of the Nandi Infrastructure Corridor between Mysore and Hosur; and the move to re-establish connections between Sarjapur and the peripheral roads, and the Hosur-Bannerghatta Road are on the anvil.