AP logs in to Facebook, IT rolls into Vijayawada

The proposal of international IT giants to buy 3.91 lakh square feet of office space in Hyderabad has raised hopes of fresh investments into the state,

The proposals of Facebook India online services, Invesco and Accenture have been cleared by the Development Commissioner of IT SEZs. Facebook will set up its office in the Raheja Mindspace special economic zone, and will launch its incubator facility in two months. The Hyderabad office will be the first office of the social networking giant in Asia.

The expansion projects of Accenture and Invesco have also been cleared. Five IT SEZs cleared by the Development Commissioner are expected to create about 5,000 new IT jobs this year.

The IT revolution, which was hitherto limited to Hyderabad city, is slowly making inroads into Tier-II and III cities and towns. L& recently completed an IT SEZ in Vijayawada on 30 acres. More than 2 lakh square feet of space in this SEZ has been purchased by Chennai-based IT companies.

Indemax, Tektracks, Galla IT services and Exranet Software have entered into agreements with the government to set up their centres in Vijayawada.

“Vijayawada is being preferred as an alternative location because of its strategic location and the cost advantage in terms of physical infrastructure and human resources,” said Ms K. Ratnaprabha, principal secretary, IT & Communications department.

Warangal, Visakhapatnam and Tirupati have also received several enquiries in the last two months.

This surge has surprised real estate developers too. Infrastructure providers like Raheja and Divyasree have sold more than 32 lakh square feet of office space mostly to IT companies.