BCG invited to open office in Vizag, TechM to set up AI CoE

Visakhapatnam: Minister for IT and Industries Gudivada Amarnath on Tuesday after talks with global leaders at World Economic Forum, Davos, there are positive indications for opening of the office of Boston Consulting Group (BCG)-prominent management consulting company and establishment of a tech university/Centre of Excellence in Artificial Intelligence in Visakhapatnam by Tech Mahindra.

He told reporters here that Chief Minister YS Jagan Mohan Reddy had convinced the participants of the State Government's efforts to develop Visakhapatnam-the largest IT and industrial city in AP-as a unicorn hub. He said the Chief Minister invited prominent unicorn companies with a value of over $1 billion to visit Visakhapatnam and assess its potential to play host to new unicorn firms. Ecosystems on the lines of Silicon Valley are being created.

Amarnath said their intention was to showcase the investment potential of AP. Stating that Hyderabad is the only developed city in IT in Telangana, he said they are promoting Visakhapatnam as the future for IT investment. He said in all, they could get investment proposals mainly in green energy from Aurobindo, Adani and Greenko. He said Jagan Mohan Reddy in his interaction with global leaders explained that AP is firm in becoming a pilot in a decarbonised economy.

During Davos visit, they had interactions with HCL, IBM, Infosys and other big companies and scoffed at criticism by the Opposition and a few media publications close to the Telugu Desam Party. He said some media groups had spread false propaganda abroad that Visakhapatnam has the risk of getting inundation/flooding.

Amarnath also criticised vested interests for spreading the talk that companies are shifting from Visakhapatnam to other places and claimed HSBC had vacated their building in the city due their priorities and in their place, WNS is occupying that space to scale up its operations.

He said unlike erstwhile TDP Government, which had signed MoUs worth over Rs 20 lakh crore at CII Partnership Summit held in Visakhapatnam, they are signing agreements with only those who are genuinely interested to invest.