The Infopark in Kochi will complete its five years of existence on November 1, 2008

The Infopark in Kochi will complete its five years of existence on November 1. The IT park, established on November 1, 2003, will celebrate the occasion with a week-long programme from November 1 to 7.

The Infopark was started with four companies and less than 50 employees on 80 acres of land taken over from the KINFRA Export Promotional Industrial Park.

At present, the Infopark has 50 IT companies, including those from the US, Europe and Australia and 8,000 IT professionals. Its present turnover is Rs 500 crore. It was Rs 66 crore in 2004- 05. The Infopark also possesses 106 acres of land.

State Information Technology Secretary Ajay Kumar, who is also the chairman of the Infopark, told to this website's newspaper on Thursday that the Infopark could achieve 85 percent software export growth in the previous fiscal while at the national level only 25 percent growth was registered.

"The Infopark could also attract various IT firms like the Smart City, the TCS, Wipro and the Larsen and Turbo to Kochi. Kochi is a fast growing city and the Infopark can achieve a lot in the IT field in Kerala," he said.

"We are proud that we could complete preparations for starting three Infoparks in Cherthala, Ambalappuzha and Koratti which will be a milestone in the history of Infopark, Kochi. All these parks will be operational within three years," said Infopark Chief Executive Officer Siddarth Bhattacharya.

Infopark senior business development manager Nisanth Kumar said that at the time of its launch the Infopark had only 1-lakh sq ft building - Thapasya.

Currently, the Infopark has 22-lakh sq ft building and the construction for another 22-lakh sq ft is in progress, he said.

It was in July 2004 that the Wipro, one of the leading firms in the Infopark, started its operation in Kochi.

The Larsen and Toubro started its operation in 2005.

Infopark senior technical advisor K Kurien said that as part of our celebrations, we are going to launch new projects like health club, monthly journal, shopping complex, club-house and guest house on the campus.

Source