Telangana's IMAGE Tower will be ready by early 2022: K T Rama

: The Telangana government's proposed IMAGE (Innovation in Multimedia, Animation, Gaming and Entertainment) tower to boost animation, gaming and visual effects sector will be ready by 2022, said IT and Industries Minister K T Rama Rao here on Wednesday.

The Minister who inaugurated 'Indiajoy 2019,' a Gaming, Media and Entertainment event here, said the government has plans to to make Telangana a hub for the South Asian industry in the gaming, technology and entertainment sector.

"On the future course, we plan to build an IMAGE tower in the city spread over 16 lakh square foot that could help global giants with anything from animation to visual effects to gaming to motion capture technologies.

"We seek to provide employment to those residing in tier-2 and tier-3 towns...IMAGE Tower will be ready by end of 2021 or early 2022," he said in his address.

According to him, Hyderabad has over 150 companies including VFX studios, 2D, 3D animation and gaming companies employing about 30,000 professionals in this segment and content worth Rs 2,000 crore is developed out of the city.

Quoting market reports, Rama Rao said the animation industry is projected to reach USD 270 billion by 2020.

The number of gaming startups in the country has gone up from 25 in 2010 to more than 250 in 2019, he said.