CM Palaniswami's foreign visits bring investment in key sectors

Biodiesel, IoT and free trade warehousing among top draw
File photo of Chief Minister Edappadi K Palaniswami and Health Minister C Vijayabaskar with other dignitaries in London.| Express
File photo of Chief Minister Edappadi K Palaniswami and Health Minister C Vijayabaskar with other dignitaries in London.| Express

CHENNAI: Sizeable Foreign Direct Investments (FDI) in key sectors, including Free Trade Warehousing Zone (FTWZ - Rs 1,000 crore), Liquefied Natural Gas (LNG - Rs 1,050 cr), biodiesel (Rs 2,000 crore), Internet of Things (IOT - Rs 1,500 crore) and Artificial Intelligence (Rs 1,000 crore) will be coming to Tamil Nadu if the MoUs signed during the visit of Chief Minister Edappadi K Palaniswami to three countries recently, materialise.   

Officials sources said the MoU on FTWZ has been signed for the first time. Already, there are two or three FTWZ private firms in the State. The upcoming FTWZ will be set up by Dubai Port World, a company of UAE government.

The DP World has bought 130 acres in front of Ennore port. It is like a Special Economic Zone in which they can produce and export to foreign countries or they can import certain things and give value addition to them and then export. 

Many hi-tech projects like Artificial intelligence, IoT are coming up. Seven companies in the US have signed MoUs for investing in artificial intelligence (AI), Among them, the highest investment has been promised by Linkay Technologies (Rs 1,000 crore). The other firms which signed MoUs in AI are: Kloud Learn, Latent.ai, SAI and Jean Martin.

Wearable Mems is investing Rs 1,500 crore in IoT sector. ACS Global Tech Solutions is investing Rs 100 crore in IoT and BlockChain. AQUIL System (Rs 100 crore) and Jean Martin (Rs 80 crore) have signed MoUs for investing in Advanced IT solutions and data analytics, block Chain, Artificial Intelligence, Machine Learning etc.

“Already, there are artificial intelligence companies in the State. Now, many such firms, functioning in large numbers in Silicon Valley have signed MoUs,” officials said.

“We are keenly monitoring execution of the MoUs signed so that these agreements fructify at the earliest. These are all facilitation MoUs, signed by the Guidance Bureau on behalf of Tamil Nadu government. We will seek details about the investment plans of these companies and what are all the facilitations required to set up their units quickly. Accordingly, the facilitations will be completed,” official sources told Express.

The officials also explained: “Some of the business ventures are eligible for incentive packages which require approval from the State cabinet. Many of the companies may decide in a few months and some other firms may take a decision keeping in mind various other factors involved in investing their money.”
 
There are companies which signed agreements for medium and smaller investments too. Indy hotels has promised to invest Rs 300 crore, Achireum will be investing in eco-tourism and heritage tourism startup. The US-based Scitus Pharma Services Private Limited, Nurray Chemicals and Novitum will be investing Rs 75 crore each.

While Scitus will provide clinical research services for pharmaceutical and biopharmaceutical industries, JOGO Health, a digital therapeutic company, will invest Rs 15 crore in a unit to develop digital medicine to treat neuromuscular diseases.

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