The Hindu Business Line : Connect2006 to focus on `Vision 2011' for TN

Major event
Mr Ramadorai, Mr Anil Ambani among speakers at `Power session'.
Theme: Talent, tier 2 cities, vision for TN.
Delegations from Japan, Tawan, Korea, Netherlands coming.

Chennai , Aug. 11

`Creating a knowledge-driven ecosystem'. This will be the theme of Connect2006, the annual information, communications and technology (ICT) event organised by the Confederation of Indian Industry (CII) in Chennai.

The highlight of the event, its sixth edition to be held from September 8 to 10, will be a "power session" that will feature speakers like Mr S. Ramadorai, CEO, TCS; Mr Anil Ambani, Chairman, Reliance Communications, Anil Dhirubhai Ambani Group; Ms Karien VanGennip, Minister for Foreign Trade, The Netherlands; Dr Ko Chen-en, President, Chung-Hua Institution for Economic Research, Taiwan; and Mr Pramod Haque, Managing Partner, Norwest Venture Partners. This session will deliberate on `Vision 2011' for Tamil Nadu and the road map the participants envision for the growth of the ICT sector in the State.

Theme-Based

Addressing a press conference to launch the event, Mr Lakshmi Narayanan, co-chairman, Connect2006, and President and CEO, Cognizant Technology Solutions, said the conference theme would have three broad categories. These are: talent - a significant challenge for the industry is to bridge the gap between supply and demand; tier-2 cities - if industry were to extend its reach and ensure supply of adequate trained manpower, it has to focus on other cities in Tamil Nadu as there cannot be a lopsided growth with all development in Chennai alone; vision for Tamil Nadu - what should it focus on.

Mr P.K. Mohapatra, Deputy Chairman, CII - southern region, later pointed out that the CII started talking about Coimbatore as a tier-2 destination some time back. In 2002, the turnover of the IT industry in Coimbatore was Rs 40 crore and it had grown to Rs 400 crore now.

Mr Gopal Srinivasan, Chairman, Connect2006, and Director, TVS Electronics, said there would be special sessions on how to develop tier-2 cities with international and national expertise on this topic being presented.

The plenary session would deal with the brand of Tamil Nadu and why it was attracting the kind of investments not just in software and business process outsourcing but also in hardware manufacture that it had done so far.

Bridging the gap

The three-day conference-cum-exposition to be held at the Chennai Trade Centre would include a two-day conference and a B2B exposition and a three-day B2C exposition.

Mr Srinivasan said there would be international participation with delegates from the Netherlands, Japan, Korea, Australia and Taiwan. The event would examine a road map for Tamil Nadu through Vision 2011.

He said the Indian IT, ITES and electronics industry had grown to $37 billion in FY2006, which was expected to grow to over $100 billion in FY2001. Tamil Nadu had a 14 per cent share of the IT and ITES segment. It had the opportunity to get a 20 per cent share, which meant a turnover of $20 billion and create about 4,00,000 jobs.

According to him, there will be partner country sessions by delegations from The Netherlands, Korea and Japan and another on `Tamil Nadu: emerging electronics manufacturing hub of Asia'. There will also be sessions on Tamil Nadu as an emerging infotainment zone - or, "from Kodambakkam to Kelambakkam," as Mr Srinivasan put it, referring to the area where the film industry is concentrated in Chennai to the emerging software zone known for its animation skills.

There will be discussions on bridging talent gap for the IT and BPO industries, and on Tier 2 and beyond.