KOCHI: IT exports during the 2023-24 fiscal earned Infopark Rs 11,417 crore, indicating a significant 24.28% increase compared to the previous year, a press release issued in Kochi on Tuesday said.
This substantial surge continues a trend of remarkable growth over the past eight years. In 2016-17, the value of IT exports from Infopark stood at just Rs 3,000 crore, at which point the IT complex accommodated 328 companies and 32,800 employees within a built-up area of 70 lakh sqft. As of April 2024, the built-up space at Infopark has expanded to 92.62 lakh sqft, hosting 582 companies and employing over 70,000 people.
The progress can be attributed to Infopark’s successful leveraging of global digitisation efforts during the Covid-19 pandemic, said CEO Susanth Kurunthil. “This has led to increased job opportunities in the IT sector, with the numbers doubling during this period,” he said. The demand for IT products started witnessing a surge in early 2020, driven by companies’ need to innovate in response to the challenges posed by the onset of the novel coronavirus and the resulting new normal. “As IT firms had to train their staff in new technologies to adapt to the situation, the sector witnessed a significant boom,” Susanth explained.
Infopark’s IT exports performed remarkably well during the pandemic, reaching Rs 6,310 crore in 2020-21 (21.35% annual growth), Rs 8,500 crore in 2021-22 (34.7% growth), and Rs 9,186 crore in 2022-23 (8.07% growth).
In addition to its Phase-1 and 2 campuses in suburban Kakkanad, Infopark also maintains a campus at Koratty in Thrissur and another in Alappuzha’s Cherthala.
Established in 2004, the Kochi Infopark currently employs over 67,000 individuals within a built-up area of 87.46 lakh sqft, housing 503 IT and ITeS companies.
The Koratty campus accommodates 58 companies and 2,000-plus employees, while the Cherthala campus is home to 21 firms and over 300 employees.