TN received Rs 6,500 cr investment in IT/ITeS industry in last 1 year: CM

Tamil Nadu has received Rs 6,500 crore as investments in the IT and ITeS industry in the last one year and it has resulted in 60,100 new jobs in the state during the period, said Chief Minister Edappadi K Palaniswami.

"In my address in 2018, I made an appeal to the captains of industry who were present, to extend continued support by way of fresh investments in Tamil Nadu. In response to my appeal, Tamil Nadu has already received 6,500 crore rupees as investments in the last one year. This has resulted in 60,100 new employments in Tamil Nadu," he said after inaugurating the CII Connect 2019, an annual conference on Information and Communication Technology jointly organised by Confederation of India (CII) along with Government of Tamil Nadu and Software Technology Parks of India (STPI).

IT/ITeS sector exports have increased nearly 10 per cent and employment has increased by four per cent in the last one year, he said while requesting the industry leaders to continue the support. In the year 2018-19, the IT and ITeS sector exports were at Rs 1,22,899 crore and it created jobs to around 6,50,000 people during the period, making the state one of the leading players in creating jobs in the segment. Chennai has emerged as the Software as a Service (SaaS) capital of the country.

The rural broadband project, Bharatnet has been implemented in the state with an investment of Rs 1,815 crore and through which 12,524 villages will be connected through optical fibre network. Besides, the state government is investing around Rs 500 crore to set up high speed internet facility across cities in the State, which will be completed in 18 months.

He requested the industry cooperation in establishing new IT Industries in emerging technologies like Blockchain, Artificial Intelligence (AI) etc., and thereby increase employment opportunity in the state. The government would be releasing an Electronics Hardware Manufacturing Policy to enable new start-ups, companies which would bring lot of investments and lot of jobs and contribute largely to the economic development.

The government launched technologies developed inhouse by Tamil Nadu e-governance Agency (TNeGA) including a technology based on AI for pest identification in crops and integrated into agriculture department's app for farmers; AI-based face recognition system currently used in two government schools for attendance; a Youtube channel for guiding people to apply for various services like income, nativity, community certificates through online; and a Tamil chatbot "Anil" using technologies developed in collaboration with Anna University, to guide and advise people by answering their queries.