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Bangalore IT fair may spawn $300 mn deals

Syed Amin Jafri in Hyderabad

Bangalore IT.Com 2002, billed as Asia's largest international Information and Communications Technology event, is likely to generate business deals worth $250 million to $300 million, according to Vivek Kurlarni, IT Secretary, Karnataka government.

Addressing a media conference along with STPI Bangalore director B V Naidu in Hyderabad on Thursday, Kulkarni said this year's IT.Com event, to be held between October 28 and November 1 at the Palace Grounds, Bangalore, is targeted at a larger audience for highlighting the emerging sectors within IT -- Business Processing Outsourcing, e-governance and banking, finance and insurance sectors.

B V Naidu said, "With 16,000 square metres of exhibition space, Bangalore IT.Com 2002 is poised to attract greater participation than last year, which had witnessed the presence of 252 companies from over 15 countries despite the IT slowdown and 9/11 terrorist attacks in the US. Business deals worth $200 million were finalised at the meet last year."

As many as 350 companies are expected to participate in this year's event. Almost 60,000 business visitors are likely to visit the five-day show. "We are expecting much more response since the economy is picking up and the industry is also getting back into shape. Since we launched the promotion activity for this event 10 days back, 20 per cent of the space is already booked," he pointed out.

Nine countries including Germany, UK, Singapore, Japan, South Korea, Sri Lanka, Bangladesh and Mauritius have confirmed their participation. "We expect participation of 25 countries. Last year, 65 foreign companies participated and we expect the number to be same this time," Naidu added.

Stating that the last few months have witnessed increased investment in the BPO sector in India and this sector has been estimated to grow to $ 24 billion by 2008 as per Nasscom-McKinsey report, Kulkarni said the Bangalore IT.Com 2002 would have a special pavilion featuring a BPO summit, an interactive session on skills for BPO as well as an exclusive short-term training course offered by the Institute of Bioinformatics and Applied Biotechnology.

The Bangalore IT.Com 2002 would feature a conference on IT for the common man with focus on emerging sectors like e-governance. This conference would provide opportunities for both state governments and IT companies to participate and present their capabilities for B2B opportunities.

The third focus area at Bangalore IT.Com 2002 would be banking, finance and insurance sector. "All in all, the Bangalore IT.Com this year offers companies, exhibitors and foreign delegations an opportunity to make presentations targeted at fostering B2B interaction. Foreign delegations will be presented a unique opportunity to meet with leading companies in the city for one-to-one interactions," Kulkarni explained.

States which have signed up for participation this year include Andhra Pradesh, Kerala, Delhi and Haryana.

"The Bangalore IT.Com 2002 will feature a special pavilion called 'Tech-states' featuring state governments that are innovative and seek to attract technology industries to their states. The technology exhibits within the trade show will have special pavilions such as IT Nations -- country pavilions, software, hardware, telecom, networking and infrastructure," the IT secretary said.

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