India's first telecom innovation hub to come up in Kerala

India is setting up its first telecom innovation hub in Kerala, modelled on the technology incubators in the Silicon Valley, under a public-private-partnership (PPP) basis.   

The National Science and Technology Entrepreneurship Development Board (NSTEDB), department of science and technology, Technopark, and MobME Wireless have joined hands to set up the hub.   

The location of the centre, which is subject to availability of land, is most likely to in Kochi, a statement issued by Kerala government said.

Kris Gopalakrishnan, Infosys co-founder and executive co-chairman, has agreed to be the chief mentor of the hub, it said.   

"With the launch of Telecom Innovation Hub, the aspiring young entrepreneurs of the state will get an opportunity to work closely with big companies and create path breaking technologies," said Kerala Industries and IT minister P K Kunhalikutty.   

It aims to incubate 1,000 product start-ups over 10 years and start the search for a billion dollar company from a college
campus by the turn of this decade.   

"NSTEDB is pleased to support this innovative PPP model," said NSTEDB head and advisor H K Mittal.  The hub aims to incubate 1,000 product start-ups over 10 years and start the search for a billion dollar company from a college campus by turn of this decade. The team involved in this initiative has already begun work on establishing the hub as a platform to setup telecom innovation zones by leading companies of international repute.

''We will be launching the innovation bub by January next year and are marketing it aggressively within the NRK community and the high networth individuals for their support,'' Sanjay Vijayakumar, CEO, MobME Wireless, said.