Karnataka to incubate 20,000 start-ups: Siddaramaiah

The tech-savy state of Karnataka will incubate about 20,000 start-ups by 2020 to create six lakh direct and 12 lakh indirect jobs, Chief Minister Siddaramaiah said on Tuesday.

"We are setting up a start-up cell as a one-stop-shop to help young entrepreneurs float start-ups and guide them in launching their ventures as they will have little knowledge of corporate affairs," Siddaramaiah said, flagging off the 18th edition of Bangalore ITE.biz 2015 here.

The Karnataka government has recently unveiled a start-up policy 2015-2020 to promote entrepreneurship, set up incubation centres, foster partnerships between research and development (R&D) and industry and provide early stage funding to start-ups.

"With hundreds of entrepreneurs with creative ideas setting up start-ups here, Bengaluru is emerging also as the country's start-up capital over a decade after it became IT capital," the chief minister asserted.

Noting that the start-up policy covered information technology, biotechnology and manufacturing sectors, Siddaramaiah said a start-up council under his chairmanship would review implementation of the policy on a regular basis for feedback and suggestions.

The start-up policy is the outcome of the state government's 'Karnataka I-4' initiative launched in 2014, spanning IT, IT-enabled services (back office and business process outsourcing), innovation and incentives.

The three-day annual event showcases the state's prowess in the knowledge sector, with over 2,000 firms, including 500 global IT majors, multinationals and offshore software development centres for services and products, operating from in and around this tech hub, providing 1.5 million direct jobs and 2.5 million indirect jobs.

"Bengaluru has the distinction of being the country's largest IT cluster, with 350 of the Fortune 500 firms locating their R&D and offshore development operations, thanks to its talent pool, research and academic institutions in the government and private sectors and best higher education system, including universities," the chief minister told about 500 delegates at the inaugural event.

The country's first electronic city, which was set up in the 1980s on the outskirts of southern Bengaluru across 400 acres of land, has become a major hub for about 200 software and hardware firms, including home-grown Indian IT bellwethers like Infosys and Wipro.

With a view to de-congest Bengaluru and promoting tier-two and tier-three cities as new destinations for investments in the high-tech sector, the state government has formed a new industrial policy, offering a slew of incentives and tax exemptions for Indian and overseas firms.

"Our state has led in technological innovation, entrepreneurship and developing an eco-system for the knowledge-based industries, as evident from the presence of 400 global in-house centres in Bengaluru, comprising captive technology and business support services," he added.

The state-run Keonics developed IT parks at Hubballi, Shivamoga and Kalaburgi to woo entrepreneurs and start-ups to set up their operations.

Infosys co-founder and Karnataka vision group on IT head S. Gopalakrishnan, IT industry representative body Nasscom chairman R. Chandrashekhar, Software Technology Parks of India (STPI) director-general Omkar Rai, IBM India managing director Vanitha Narayanan and Karnataka principal secretary, IT, V. Manjula also spoke on the occasion.