By IANS,
Thiruvananthapuram : The information technology (IT) sector in Kerala has registered an all-round growth in key indicators such as employment, turnover, built-up area and incubation of new companies, the state government said Thursday.
In a presentation on the sector’s performance, IT Secretary P.H. Kurian said the land area IT companies occupied in the state was 786 acres with a built-up area of 4.5 million square feet that employed over 40,500 people in 285 companies.
“IT exports are expected to touch Rs.3,500 crore for this fiscal, up from Rs.1,335 crore in the last fiscal. Ten more IT parks are expected to come up in the state soon,” he said.
IT Minister P.K. Kunhalikutty told reporters that it was not proper to compare the turnover of software companies in Kerala with that of Karnataka.
“Many of the companies that have offices here have head offices in Karnataka or in other states and hence the output from such companies in our state gets accounted elsewhere. What has to be looked into is the IT penetration, usage and IT education and in all these, Kerala leads,” he said.
Sanjay Vijayakumar, chairman of Startup Village, the first public-private partnership mode incubator in the country in Kochi, said the government’s support to startups was reaping success.
“Earlier, we used to get around 20 applications a month and after a a new scheme was announced at ‘Emerging Kerala’, this has jumped to 100 applications,” he said.