Kochi Telecommunications Gateway: Looking ahead

Kochi: The Infosys centre at Chennai plans to access Kochi's telecommunication gateway, according to company sources here. VSNL's set up at Kochi offers the country's fastest optical cable network with a speed of 5000 gigabytes per second — having greater bandwidth than the optical landing centre at Chennai.

Infosys is setting up the country's largest software development centre at the Mahindra City in Chennai, at an investment of Rs.1250 crore. With another InfoTech major, Wipro, announcing plans to set up huge campuses at Coimbatore and Chennai, this move by Infosys further improves the prospects of the telecommunications gateway at Kochi. It is likely that Wipro's development facility at Coimbatore may well find it economical to transfer data through Kochi.

Nearly 80 per cent of the gateway at Kochi lies unutilised. Of the bandwidth currently under utilization, Bangalore based company's access around 25 per cent, while Hyderabad and Mumbai based company's access 15 per cent each. While the Chennai based companies access around 20 per cent, the Delhi based companies utilise the remaining10 per cent.