BENGALURU: The Karnataka Government is aiming to achieve the top position in India’s bio-economy and digital economy. Chief Minister B S Yediyurappa on Thursday said one of the key goals of the state is to achieve 50 per cent market share of the national bio-economy (biotechnology economy) of $100 billion by 2025, and added that necessary steps have already been taken in this direction.
Addressing the inauguration of the Bengaluru Tech Summit 2020, Yediyurappa assured of Karnataka playing a pivotal role in making India a $5 trillion economy and pointed out that the state already has the most progressive start-up ecosystem. He pointed out that four of the seven start-ups, which had become ‘start-up unicorns’ in India in 2020, were from Karnataka.
Steps to push IT beyond B’luru: CM
Speaking about the massive growth of biotechnology in the state, Biocon Ltd Chairperson and Managing Director Kiran Mazumdar-Shaw said Karnataka’s bio-economy was estimated to contribute $22.6 billion in 2019, accounting for 10.2 per cent of Karnataka’s GDP, while the national share of bio-economy is at $62.5 billion, or 2.3 per cent of India’s GDP.
“And although at present, the state accounts for a third of India’s bio-economy, the goal is to reach 50 per cent of the $100 billion bio-economy that the country aims to achieve by 2025,” she added. Yediyurappa assured Union Minister for Electronics, I nformation Technology and Communications, Ravishankar Prasad, who participated virtually in the session, of taking necessary steps to make Karnataka the leader in data economy.
He said steps were being taken to push IT beyond Benglauru to generate over 60 lakh direct and indirect jobs in five years. Deputy Chief Minister Dr C N Ashwath Narayan termed the pandemic as the “Y2K moment” of the coming decade and said rapid development of infrastructure in two sectors — connectivity and communication — will be addressed through a single-window mechanism.
“We will mould Karnataka from a $52 billion digital economy to a $300 billion one in the next five years, while the present share of $36 billion in biotech will reach $100 billion in the same period,” he said. On the air connectivity front, he said operation of many UDAAN airports in the state will make travel easy. Rapid penetration of 4G — and in a few months, 5G network — will solve communication issues, he said. The Karnataka Digital Economy Mission will use the ‘Invest India’ model to build global linkages for promoting the state’s tech industry, Ashwath Narayan said.