Not all MoUs will convert into units, says Telangana IT Minister

Not every company that has signed a memorandum of understanding with the Telangana government will go on to establish operations in the State, Industries and IT Minister D. Sridhar Babu told the Legislative Assembly.

Firms that have expressed interest must first meet conditions such as achieving financial closure before they commit capital, the Minister said. The State signed 108 MoUs envisaging investments of about ₹5.86 lakh crore during the global summit and the Telangana Rising delegation's visit to Davos for the World Economic Forum meeting.

Mr. Sridhar Babu said prospective investors weigh a range of facilities before deciding to expand, including five-star hotels for senior officials, international schools and reputed hospitals. He recalled that during Chief Minister A. Revanth Reddy's interactions with industrialists in Davos, the head of a leading IT company asked about the facilities on offer.

Companies, he added, look for a proper ecosystem and are ultimately guided by profitability when expanding their presence.

On the demand for IT towers in Tier-II cities, the Minister said a tower in Adilabad is expected to be inaugurated within a couple of days. The government is now seeking anchor companies to set up IT towers, along with supporting firms to make them viable. He criticised the previous government's approach, saying IT towers were used to promote real estate and several of them remain vacant.

The State has drawn global capability centres and is now turning its attention to data centres. HyperVault, a TCS subsidiary, has begun work on a 1 GW data centre with an estimated investment of ₹70,000 crore. Such facilities prefer locations near IT hubs because of processing time, and consume large amounts of power and water, the Minister said.

He noted that data centres hold significant employment potential from the construction stage onward, with scope for direct and indirect jobs. Construction workers can expect two to three years of employment, ancillaries will set up units nearby, and server manufacturers have begun enquiring about investment prospects since the data centre announcements.