Sunday, October 7, 2012

US Business Delegation to Visit New Town on 16th Oct

Last Friday afternoon, representatives of the Bharat Chamber of Commerce and US Consulate met me at Hidco. A 35-member team from USA will visit Kolkata for a 2-day visit. On the evening of 16th Oct, Tuesday, they will visit Hidco. I will make a presentation outlining opportunities for architects, planners, investors and urban experts. Details are being worked out. I will have an in-house meeting at Hidco on Monday.

11 comments:

  1. This is a fantastic piece of news actually. Hope we do a mesmerizing presentation for them.

    Are we planning to give them a presentation for Digha? Magical touch of US investments can transform Bengal coastline. However DSDA website needs to be revamped if they want to go back and do a google search and toilet photos need to be removed from project gallery.


    I am pretty sure you are planning to give a presentation on Finance Hub. Sir, can we have a really professional presentation which can get Kolkata presented as a really compelling upcoming financial hub?


    Also I thing we should look for the technology sector. US west coast ( California) technology R & D companies are present in huge numbers in Bangalore, Hyderabad and Madras. They are totally absent in Kolkata. These companies are Netapp, VMWare, LSI, Brocade, Cisco , Facebook , Google, Amazon , Microsoft etc to name a few. These companies do not buy land and operate from rented office spaces while employing thousands of people. We can have a special session for these technology R & D companies .


    Also I think you are going to cover 24 storey VLSI centre (IDC) coming up in Salt Lake. This building can act as a catalyst for investment in Kolkata.

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    1. If I am not wrong, I have read somewhere CISCO has already taken up some space in Godrej Waterside. I am sot sure if this is true or not, but I have read it in one of the English Dailies some months ago.

      But yes true, Google, Oracle, Microsoft, if WB Govt can pull one of these, getting others will become very easy. It is our reputation that is being the deterrant. I hav also heard that Oracle and SAS had some plans opening Kolkata R&D centre some years back, but they scrapped the plan due to obvious reasons. We need to get their confidence back for good.

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    2. Hi Debdeep,

      As far as I know, thats the sales office of Cisco. But I was talking about their R & D Centre ( with dev / qa roles) . I dont think Cisco has opened R & D centre in Kolkata .

      But if Kolkata needs to move up the value chain in IT, we need to attract these companies. The good point is that these companies operate from built-up office spaces and dont opt for land.

      Oracle should be a pretty easy target. They have opened offices even in Trivandrum.

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  2. I happen to work in one of these tech R & D companies from California. If you need any details from me ( CEO name, India address, India head contact details etc), do let me know. I will be more than willing to help.

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  3. Sir, I am from a Kolkata based Architectural firm currently doing decent number of projects across India.Just curious to know, if your presentation is also open for Indian/Kolkata based firms to participate?

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  4. Normally this may not be allowed? However, should you wish, you may send your profile and request to me at debashisen@gmail.com

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  5. I think NEWTOWN can be a good investment zone for service sector which was opened during 90's:IT/ITES,ENGG, MANAGEMENT CONSULTANCY firm etc.People had already informed about many IT companies but other ENGG CONSULTANCY FIRM(BECHTEL, FLUOR,ATKINS,TOSHIBA,DOOSAN ETC) or other CONSULTANCY SERVICE PROVIDER(McKinsey, BOSTON CONSULTANCY GROUP,BAIN, DELOITTE etc)can also open their offices here.Because of nature of business we can make NEWTOWN a HUB FOR SERVICE SECTOR.

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  6. Are the top bosses of US based firms operating out of Kolkata (e.g. IBM) invited? They might be able to vouch for infrastructure support they get from the government - an American firm speaking on your behalf might have an impact - just a thought.

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  7. Sir, keen to participate in your presentation on 16th Oct.I have sent our profile in your Gmail id provided above.

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