NEW DELHI, INDIA: Communications and Manufacturing Association of India (CMAI), an India-based non profit trade promotion organisation, on Wednesday announced channelising $100 million venture fund to promote environment-friendly research and manufacturing projects in the ICT sector for Indo-Korean corporation.

Addresing a press conference on the Indo Korean business opportunities, N K Goyal, president of CMAI, said, “In spite of the current slowdown in the telecom sector, Korea has become the world’s most exciting broadband market with the highest broadband penetration in the world, which is about 96 per cent.”

“Moreover, India is witnessing highest growth in telecom sector with addition of more than 8-9 million subscribers per month,” added Goyal.

“India has immense potential and we wish to partner to support economic growth and development in the ICI sector,” said Park Won Geun, vice president of KADO, a South Korean government subsidiary devoted to providing comprehensive support for domestic and international digital divide closure.

“We aim at bridging the digital divide by supporting international cooperation to improve access to information and communication infrastructure and technologies; share and exchange knowledge and experiences; build ICT capacity; foster technology exchange and transfer; and many more,” he added.

India is already the second highest in telecom subscriber base with 300 million subscribers and is poised to reach 500 million by 2010. The broadband target has been set as 20 million by the year 2010.

The country already has embraced CDMA, GSM technology and promotes technology-neutral solutions. India has also decided to promote 3G and has allotted 2.1 GHz frequency band for this. For broadband wireless, India has earmarked 2.5 GHz band.

“The telecom equipment market will be worth over $20 billion by 2010,” according to Goyal.