Karnataka To Soon Get 6 New High-Tech Cities, A Startup Park: CM Bommai

Karnataka Chief Minister Basavaraj Bommai on Wednesday (November 16) said that the state government will build six new high-tech cities in Gulbarga, Hubli, Dharwad, Mysore, Mangaluru, and central Karnataka areas, and one of those cities will be announced within six months.

Bommai was speaking at the 25th Bengaluru Tech Summit, which was inaugurated by Prime Minister Narendra Modi.

Emphasising the need for technology innovation centres to move beyond Bengaluru to other regions of the state, Bommai said that one of the new cities would be close to Bengaluru and will be the knowledge, science, and tech city with the best R&D centres, universities, and industries. 

Besides the new cities, Bommai also announced the establishment of a startup park in Karnataka within six months.

“We will have a startup park where it can be a multi-model park in different sectors right from agritech to genomics. This is also going to come in the next six months,” Bommai said, adding that it will be close to an airport.

He cited growing enthusiasm and the energy of startups as the reason behind the move. 

“By looking at the growth and energy of the startups, we are really overwhelmed and that is the future of our young minds,” Bommai said. He added that the government has taken several steps to support startups, but needs to do more. 

The Karnataka government has been mulling establishing a startup park for a long time now, while it has also started focusing on cities beyond Bengaluru to grow them as startup and technology hubs. 

Speaking to Inc42 earlier this year, Karnataka’s IT & Education Minister Dr C. N. Ashwath Narayan said that the state government was enabling the growth of the startup ecosystem beyond its capital city with the help of Karnataka Digital Economy Mission (KDEM).

The KDEM launched the ‘Beyond Bengaluru Startup Grid’ in November last year to tap startups beyond the capital city in the clusters of Mysuru, Mangalore, and Hubli.

Besides Bommai, the three-day Bengaluru Tech Summit was also attended by Ashwath Narayan, KDEM Chairman BV Naidu, Biocon’s Kiran Mazumdar Shaw, and other national and international dignitaries.

Prime Minister Modi, in his virtual inaugural address, said that Bengaluru is the home of technology and thought leadership. The city has been ranked number one on India’s Innovation Index for several years now, while India has jumped to the 40th rank in the Global Innovation Index this year from 81st rank in 2015, he added.