Telangana is not just competing with sister states within India but is competing with countries of our size: D. Sridhar Babu, IT Minister

Hyderabad, January 29, 2024:  Investment opportunities in Telangana State were showcased in a round table conference held today at T-Hub to 12 member delegates from the Nordics, Estonia and Western Europe.
 

Some of the prominent ones of the 12-member delegation were JAB Holdings (they own all the large coffee brands like Peets Coffee, Krispy Kreme and Pret), Whitestone Capital, Metaplanet holding (Founder of Skype) and Bjella Investments from Norway. The combined holdings of just these 4 Family offices are over $100B in assets under management.

 
The round table was the initiative of the Government of Telangana, NAR Infra Pvt. Ltd and Prasad Vanga, CEO and Founder of Anthill Venture, a Speed Scaling Ecosystem that invests in, and scales, early-stage companies in Media, Urban Tech and Health Tech. Prasad Vanga is a successful entrepreneur, angel investor and business transformation coach.
 

Anthill Ventures has invited the delegation to Hyderabad, and Parvathi Reddy seized the opportunity to get the government involved and showcase Telangana as an investment potential state. Being an entrepreneur herself and having a lot of work in the state herself, she understands the governance and ease of doing business here, the skilled workforce available, the infrastructure, the safety, and the liveability all included make Hyderabad and Telangana a great place to do business. She has taken it upon herself to showcase Telangana as the best destination for opportunities and investments.
 

The delegation was convinced by the Government of Telangana to come to Hyderabad over other cities because of our innovative outlook and a strong focus on entrepreneurship said N. Parvathi Reddy one of the panel speakers and Co-Founder and Executive Director at NAR Infra Pvt. Ltd. an industry leader in the infrastructure sector in India.
 

D. Sridhar Babu Minister of IT, Government of Telangana; N. Parvathi Reddy, FICCI FLO Young Leader and alumni of Family Business from the Indian School of Business (ISB) Hyderabad; CEO of T-Hub Srinivas Rao Mahankali and Honourable Principal Secretary ITE & C Jayesh Ranjan; Founder of the Family Office Alliance Philip von Wulffen & Anthill Venture’s CEO & Founder Prasad Vanga and others participated.
 

Speaking on the occasion D. Sridhar Babu said Telangana is the youngest but the best state in terms of human capital, infrastructure, proactive government and in ease of doing business.  The state is not just competing with sister states in India, but is also competing with countries of our size. Please come forward and invest in the state. You will have minimal government intervention in your affairs.  Last year the Telangana state got Rs 20,000 crore investments.  This year we have already signed MoUs worth Rs 40,000 crore in investments.
 

Jayesh Ranjan asked why tech companies prefer Hyderabad and Telangana.  It is because of the talent pool. When I say this, it doesn’t mean that other cities don’t have.  We compete with cities like Bangalore, Chennai, Pune, and Gurgaon. When compared to these cities our talent pool proved more productive, work-minded, and lived up to their deliverability.  This was proven again during the pandemic. They proved to be a more responsible workforce.  This was observed by many CEOs and they told us.  The workforce here takes up challenges and lives up to those challenges. The attrition rate in Hyderabad is 6-7% lower compared to Bengaluru and the cost of acquiring talent is 15% lower. 
 

The main driver of the tech industry is innovation. When I say these other cities are also doing well in terms of innovation and even better than us.  But what makes this city apart from the rest is the innovation ecosystem and the state-of-the-art centres of excellence and innovation hubs, Jayesh Ranjan added.    
 

We will continue the progress of the state.  Policies of the previous government/s if good will be better and continued. 
 

The Founder of the Family Office Alliance Philip von Wulffen & Anthill Venture’s CEO & Founder Prasad Vanga spoke on the manifestation & evolution of the Family Office Alliance
 

Family Office Alliance is an entity established by a wealthy individual/s to manage the family's wealth.
 

The Family Office Panel Discussion was held with the founder of Cyient & Chairman at IIT Hyderabad BVR Mohan Reddy, iLabs Founder Srinivasa Raju Chintalapati and noted dignitaries including CEO at Bjella Investments Kristin Bjelland & General Partner at White Star Capital Cristina Ventura.
 

AI In Everything We Do — An Innovation Panel Discussion held with actor, producer and tech-preneur Rana Daggubati, Rauno Miljand who manages Skype in addition to his personal family offices, Peder Wallenberg, Senior Partner at Cohesion Investments and Akis Evangelidis, Co-Founder of Nothing.
 

Aditya Ghosh, former president and full-time director of IndiGo and co-founder of Akasa Air with Vinay Dube spoke on Scaling up in India. Giving his keynote address, Aditya Ghosh shared his experience in transforming and leading India’s largest & most profitable airline.
 

All the panellists shared their ideas and points of view on the growth story of Telangana.
 

In the end, the delegation had an exclusive tour of T-Works, India’s largest prototyping centre.