Aussie varsity to invest in Bangalore

BANGALORE, INDIA: To address the employable talent crunch and to fill the skill gap in the IT industry, the government of Karnataka is in talks with Australia’s Deakin University to set up Deakin India Research Initiative (DIRI) in Bangalore.

DIRI would involve an investment of Australian $76 million. Deakin would contribute 50 per cent while Karnataka and the government of India would put in 25 per cent each.

“This will be the first major foreign university to be set up in India. Once the institute is set up, it will be able to produce over 300–400 PhDs in biotech sector,” said MN Vidyashankar, secretary, information technology and Biotechnology, government of Karnataka.

Vidyashankar made the announcement after inaugurating the Confederation of Indian Industry Global Enterprise Product Support (CII-GEPS) forum in Bangalore. He said that though there are bottlenecks, the brand Bangalore story still continues. However, there is lack of employable talent.

“Currently, IT contributed 4.9 per cent to the national GDP. In Karnataka IT contributes over 26 per cent to the GDP. The GoK (government of Karnataka) targets to increase it to 50 per cent by 2011,” said Vidyashankar.

Bidadi park after DLF handover

Vidyashankar also announced that the much-awaited IT park in Bidadi, which occupies 10,000 acres of land and has 25000 sq. ft. build in space, will be functional within 18 months after the date of hand over by DLF builders. DLF has invested over Rs 50,000 crore in this project.

The first stage of Biotech Park, spread over 109 acres, will be inaugurated by end of February this year. The second and third stage will be ready in the next 18 months.

US- based builder Alexandria Equity Group has invested Rs 60,000 million for the second and third stage of the Biotech Park.

He also announced that government is planning to set up the second IISc campus in the city to coincide with the 100 years celebration of the IISc.