With same benefits as special economic zones (SEZs), these regions will offer best infrastructure to IT companies outside Tier-I cities.

Department of Information Technology Secretary Jainder Singh said the Centre and state governments would jointly develop infrastructure in the proposed IT investment regions, while addressing the Hyderabad IT Summit 2008, which began at International Convention Centre here on Thursday.

Underlining the need for a movement to Tier-II and Tier-III cities, he said cities like Coimbatore, Mysore, Bhubaneswar, Chandigarh and Visakhapatnam were already moving ahead. Cities like Kakinada, Vijayawada, Warangal and Tirupati in Andhra Pradesh were also growing.

Spreading benefits

“The movement to Tier-II and Tier-III cities is necessary as infrastructure in metro cities is overloaded. This is also necessary for cost competitiveness, attracting human resources and for spreading benefits of IT to rural areas for balanced regional development in the country,” he observed.

Mr Jainder Singh said IT exports from the country were $31 billion in the last financial year and was expected to reach $40 billion during 2007-08 and $60 billion by 2010.

Incidentally, the Indian IT industry is contributing 5.4 per cent of country’s GDP and 25 per cent of total exports.