Infosys Technologies Ltd has agreed in principle to set up a software development centre in Kolkata, West Bengal Chief Minister Buddhadev Bhattacharjee said on Friday.

"I was trying to convince Mr Narayana Murthy (Infosys founder and chairman) for the last 3-4 years to come to Kolkata and finally he has accepted our invitation and agreed in principle," Bhattacharjee said at an industry-academia meet for IT and ITeS sector jointly organised by Confederation of Indian Industry, National Association of Software and Service Companies and West Bengal government's IT department.

He said despite being a late starter West Bengal had been making rapid strides in the IT sector.

"West Bengal's share in the country's total IT export increased from three per cent in 2002 to five per cent in 2003. Now our target is to achieve 15 per cent share in IT and 20 per cent in ITES by 2010," he said.

At present, Kolkata had a stable infrastructure back-up with quality power and strong connectivity in place. Adequate bandwidth in the gateways was also available to meet the requirements of IT and ITES industries, he said.

Kolkata offered about 580 Mbps of international satellite connectivity through Videsh Sanchar Nigam Ltd and Software Technology Parks of India. Two more satellite earth stations at Durgapur and Kharagpur had also started functioning recently, Bhattacharjee said.

Besides VSNL, private players like Reliance Infocomm and Bharti were operating in Kolkata and providing adequate bandwidth, he said, adding the built-up infrastructure was readily available for any IT unit to start operations immediately.

Bhattacharjee said the state government had taken steps to create software technology parks in places other than Kolkata to spread IT industry and match future demands.

To meet the emerging demands, two more locations at the Sunrise City near the Eastern Metropolitan By-pass were being developed, he said.