IT MAJOR Impetus Technologies Inc chief executive officer Praveen Kankariya feels that the State Government needs to have a pinpointed focus to develop Indore as a model city for IT industry and then replicate the same in other cities like Bhopal and Gwalior.
Kankariya, who did his B.E from SGSITS and built Impetus from Indore, in an exclusive interview to Hindustan Times during his recent visit here said, “The problem is that government is focussing on the entire State (for promoting IT) which is diluting the effort,” he said. Madhya Pradesh needs to follow the successful model of states like Karnataka and Andhra Pradesh to become an IT power, he feels.
Now headquartered in California, USA, Impetus is one of the fastest growing IT companies today having a 600-employee strong development centre in Indore, a 200-employee centre in Noida, another centre in Hyderabad besides centres in the US.
In a statement that should set alarm bells ringing for State Government, Kankariya said the company’s Noida centre was growing faster than Indore and he expects the critical mass of Impetus to shift outside Madhya Pradesh “pretty soon.” The biggest problem before IT companies in Indore is that of manpower crunch, particularly at the managerial level. Indore at present has around 1500 IT professionals, mostly junior level.
“We grew at 75 per cent last year, but the customer-generated demand was probably 100 per cent, so we probably left 25 per cent on the table for lack of very qualified people,” said Kankariya.
{{/usCountry}}“We grew at 75 per cent last year, but the customer-generated demand was probably 100 per cent, so we probably left 25 per cent on the table for lack of very qualified people,” said Kankariya.
{{/usCountry}}“The basic problem that we face today is how to create the momentum (in Indore), but there is no one solution and infrastructure is just part of it,” he said.
Elaborating, he said it was like chicken and egg situation wherein big IT companies are reluctant to come to Indore because they are worried about infrastructure and IT professionals are also hesitating to move in because there are just a handful of companies.
Impetus Senior Vice President Pankaj Mittal, who was also present, said “If we look at cities like Pune, Hyderabad, Bangalore and even Trivandrum, the governments there focussed on developing these cities and attracting IT companies before they moved on to other smaller cities.”
“We need to make Indore better than these cities to attract the young population”, says Kankariya adding “anybody who works in IT sector already is in upper middle class society and they should like the place. Right now if somebody comes from Pune, they are disheartened by the drive from (Indore) airport.”