The Birla Research & Life Sciences Ltd has signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with government of Andhra Pradesh to build a Global Integrated Ayurveda Complex in the state. Under the MoU, the Birla Group will invest Rs.704 crore in the state to construct the state-of-the-art complex.
Earlier, as part of its partnership summit-2012 held in Hyderabad at HICC (Hyderabad international convention centre), the state government had signed Memorandum of Understandings with different companies. On the first day, the government had reached agreements worth Rs.76,000 crore with top reputed global companies. The event was organized for two days by the Confederation of Indian Industry (CII) in association with government of Andhra Pradesh and central governments. It is expected that the summit will help bring investments worth Rs.5 lakh crore to the state.
The GMR Holdings Pvt Ltd is planning to invest Rs.30,000 crore on a Refinery cum Petrochemicals Complex in the state. Further, the GMR Infrastructure Ltd is also planning to invest Rs.3,000 crore on a multi-products SEZ. Similarly, the UAE based B R Shetty of UUAE Exchange and NMC Group have also reached an understanding with the state government to invest Rs.30,000 crore on a Petroleum Refinery at the PCPIR Region in Visakhapatnam. The Birla Surya Ltd too has agreed to invest in the Advanced Solar Photovoltaic with an investment of Rs.22,000 crore.
Apart from its investment in the global integrated Ayurveda complex, the Birla group is also investing worth Rs.2000 crore in education, employment, Technology, infrastructure and Industry development. Meanwhile, the Hyderabad based GVK Power and Infrastructure has also agreed to sign a MoU with the government for setting up 2400-MW thermal power plant in coastal Andhra. The company will invest around Rs.10,000-crore on the project. It will import coal from its Hancock coal mine in Australia for the new plant.
The partnership summit has brought in a new enthusiasm among the industry especially the pharma sector, because it was almost more than 9 years for such a summit to happen in Hyderabad. From government point of view the summit is a great success as it will rebuild the state’s image as a friendly investment destination. During the past two years the state had seen a series of continuous disturbances---the Telangana agitation, internal political disturbances among parties and adding to this, the global economic meltdown and the ensuing corporate scams like Satyam, Maytas etc.
The partnership summit was attended by more than 1200 delegates, including 350 foreign delegates from 43 countries. Trade and economic ministers from 15 countries have also attended.