STPI’s incubation centre coming up in Kovai, Rs 40 crore earmarked

To set up the STPI-IT (information technology) incubation centre at the Government College of Technology, Coimbatore, the government has allotted three acres of land, STPI Director-General Omkar Rai said here.

“The investments expected will be Rs 40 crore. This will cater to the needs of IT, IT-enabled services. It will also give a boost to entrepreneurship and exports from the region,” he told reporters here. For setting up the incubation centre, a Memorandum of Understanding was signed in the presence of secretary to department of higher education Mangat Ram Sharma and Omkar Rai.

The centre would facilitate and support the entrepreneurs of the state to explore global opportunity in the IT and IT-enabled services. “STPI will create a state-of-the-art incubation centre for providing raw and plug-in-play incubation facility to the industry especially for start-ups and entrepreneurs,” he said.

The initiative would further strengthen the industry-academia relationship and also offer a platform for ‘Future-Ready Technology’, especially in Coimbatore. With the facility, the employability skills can be achieved by transforming graduates into professionals by conducting special trainings in block chain, artificial intelligence, machine learning and internet of things, he said.

Meanwhile, Rai also presided over the official launch of FinBlue, TN’s dedicated Centre of Excellence in Fintech here. He said, “We are delighted to launch a CoE for FinTech in Tamil Nadu. This is a part of STPI’s nationwide initiative to transform India into Software Product Nation capitalising on the strong IT Services Industries by providing an ecosystem in all the emerging technologies.” This is being done in collaboration with various stakeholders.

Also, STPI in association with ELCOT, Govt of TN announced the launch of start-up Pitch Fest for identifying eligible and innovative start-ups for FinBlue programme, the Centre of Excellence a first-of-its-kind incubation facility that aims to further strengthen India as the leader in FinTech industry by providing accessibility to technology, mentorship and more.