TN eyes small towns for next start-up revolution

At the CII – Connect 2016, the annual Conference and Exhibition on Information and Communication Technology (ICT), held this week, TK Ramachandran, IAS, Principal Secretary – Information Technology, Government of Tamil Nadu had remarked, “Tamil Nadu provides an entrepreneurial environment that is the best in India. As part of our efforts to encourage young entrepreneurs in the state, the CM has announced the proposal to set up a start-up warehouse in Coimbatore. 

We already have a startup warehouse in Tidel Park in Chennai, where there are 80 people working.” The warehouse is basically a workspace that allows start-ups to function and network with peer-groups. Apart from giving start-ups much needed venture capital support, the warehouses are also essential for providing marketing advice and mentoring support. 

Ramachandran also spoke about the state’s keenness on supporting start-ups that are not specifically IT-centric. He says, “TN as a state has a culture of entrepreneurship and we are open to the idea of any start-up, not necessarily an IT-driven start-up. What we need are youngsters driven by passion, energy, enthusiasm and ideas. We started focussing on Tier 2 cities as part of building this ecosystem a long time ago. We now have these Tamil groups set up in 60 different colleges and they are looking at providing Tamil computing solutions for a variety of applications.”