 For global IT giants, India is a favoured destination. Companies such as Google have announced billion-dollar investments and many of these plans are in the drawing board stage. But commerce ministry officials tell CNBC-TV18 that all these companies have made it clear that investments in India hinge upon grant of SEZ status.
Commerce ministry officials say that it is not only the domestic IT industry that's betting big on SEZs, global IT giants such as Google, Dell, Foxcon have informed the government that their investments in India would be through the SEZ route.
Google had committed a billion-dollar investment in India. Officials say that 500,000 sq metres of land would be acquired by Google to set up a second global headquarters. Officials say that it is not just Google, but Dell too would be ploughing in $60 million in India through the SEZ route.
Sources say Dell has already acquired 100 hectares of land near Chennai. Taiwanse telecom equipment maker, Foxcon, Motorola and Samsung are the other companies jumping onto the SEZ bandwagon. Sources say that Foxcon is likely to invest close to a billion dollars in India.
And that's not all. Sources say that Singapore based, real estate giant, the Ascendas Group plans on setting up a 5,000-acre multi product SEZ near Chennai with investments close to $1.5 billion. This would house only Japanese companies.
The group is expected to submit a formal proposal soon. Commerce ministry officials also say that for the 110 approved IT SEZs in the country, 12 lakh jobs will be created. At the last meeting of the group of ministers on Special Economic Zones, the finance minister had expressed concerns on the number of IT SEZs coming up.
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