In its race against the major IT development centres in the country, Chennai has scored a point over Mumbai and Gurgaon in terms of employee attrition rates.
A state government official, citing industry sources, said that while the average attrition rate in Mumbai and Gurgaon were in the region of 75 per cent 60 per cent, respectively, Chennai's attrition rate at 13 per cent was the lowest in the country.
Speaking at Anigra 2003, an international seminar on animation and graphics organised by Hindustan College of Engineering and Inspirez Technologies, the state IT secretary, Vivek Harinarain, said: "Tamil Nadu has come a long way in terms of IT exports. In the last two years we have grown by 100 per cent and IT exports from the state today stand at Rs 7,000 crore (Rs 70 billion)."
Harinarain also said that Chennai had a good chance of emerging as a animation hub of the country.
"We have a strong educational infrastructure in the arts and with the talent pool in terms of computer aided design and graphics, Chennai can aspire to emerge as a animation hub of India," he remarked.
Quoting the industry data, he said, "Globally the animation industry is estimated to touch $70 billion in the next three to four years from the present $25 billion. India should not just look at the entertainment side of the animation business but also non-entertainment prospects in the field of education and health."
He assured the participants at the seminar that any proposal brought to the Tamil Nadu government that would help in employment creation, wealth generation and wealth dissemination would be considered seriously.
He suggested that the outcome of the seminar be documented and a white paper developed to explore the possibility of making animation the next big wave in the IT industry.
