Source: Times of India
BANGALORE, INDIA, July 21, 2002: Bangalore has been named one of the top seven intelligent communities in the world for 2002 by Intelligent Community Forum (ICF), a project of the World Teleport Association. An ICF report says Bangalore is one of the world’s top centers of technology development and “since the mid-1990’s, there has been a creation of fast-growing and affluent community of software professionals.” “Bangalore’s success is due to the effective economic development marketing of a government agency, software technology parks of India to the grassroots efforts of Indian software engineers and entrepreneurs in the US, who have opened eyes to the potential in their native country and to a local commitment to education and training that has made Bangalore the home of nearly 20 percent of Indian’s total institutions of higher education,” the report says. Bangalore has more than 100 research universities and technical colleges and employs about 80,000 people in the high-tech industry. ICF notes hundreds of international companies, including IBM, Microsoft, and American Express, have set up software development centers or contracted with local firms in order to take advantage of Bangalore’s highly-trained, English-speaking computer graduates. The other six intelligent communities named by ICF are: Calgary in Canada, Florida High Tech Corridor Council and LaGrange in the US, Seoul in South Korea, Singapore, and Sunderland in the UK.