Cyberabad Calling...

After completing his B Tech from IIT (Delhi) in 1985, Kumar joined TISCO. He
has been trusted with diverse responsibilities from sub-collector and project
director for the District rural development agency to the CEO of the Zilla
Parishad. He took over the current responsibilities in the IT arena in July 2000
and has been responsible for investment promotion and business development in
AP. DATAQUEST met Kumar to discuss his IT plans...

AP has been in the news with reference to IT. What have
been the government initiatives?

The IT industry has come a long way in Andhra Pradesh,
especially Hyderabad. The whole thing started somewhere in 1996 with the
commissioning of the Vision 20:20 document prepared by McKinsey for the state
government. The document identified a growth engine for the state economy.

Once the document was commissioned, we decided to go for it
in a big way. Starting at about 2% of the national IT economy in terms of
revenue and exports, today we have a 10% share in the national IT pie. Eight
years ago our IT revenues were a mere Rs 40 lakh and today, they have touched
over Rs 200 crore, or a CAGR of over 107%. We have over 1200 IT companies in AP
with over 60,000 people employed in Hyderabad alone.

All the states have been gung-ho about software but have
no plans about hardware. Is it the same with Andhra Pradesh?

I agree that software has been given prominence so far and at
the cost of hardware. We would like to correct that. We are making a 5000-acre
hardware park with a custom corridor to the international airport that is coming
up in Hyderabad. Since the hardware industry is logistics driven, we have been
talking to some of the biggest names in the hardware assembly business and
studying their facilities abroad. For instance, the Penang Facility, Malaysia
takes about four and half minutes to have the finished computer in the air
carrier. That’s the facility we want to replicate to bring in the hardware
manufacturers. We are getting Singapore based Jurong Park Corporation to set up
the pilot project for us. We are trying to implement the computer based EDI
system like Singapore and are talking to the finance ministry about it.

What has been the impact of IT on the common people?

There has been a tremendous improvement in the Government’s
internal efficiencies. Take the power sector. With the help of intensive
monitoring by the CM himself, we have been able to bring up the plant load
factor from the 56% range to over 92%. Had we gone the old way of setting up
green field projects and then increasing power, it would have cost the state
about Rs 10,000 crore. Now the amount is available for other sectors. Besides,
IT has transformed the whole paradigm of the administration. While many are
still being implemented, the web-based service will help citizens access all the
government services in a more efficient, convenient and transparent manner.
Besides, 7500 Internet kiosks are coming up.

A DATAQUEST report