Kerala is all set to play a crucial role in the efforts to make India a global deep tech capital. Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan said that the investment opportunities offered, especially through the Emerging Technology Hub (ETH) initiative, will lead to the holistic development of Kerala. He was speaking at the inauguration of Huddle Global 2024, a national-level start-up fair organised by the Kerala Start-up Mission (KSUM) at the beach tourism hub in Kovalam.

The Chief Minister said that the Emerging Technology Hub (ETH) initiative highlights five high growth areas. Agriculture, Space Technology, Renewable Energy, Digital Media, Entertainment and Health. Vijayan said the ETH initiative is envisaged as a futuristic product development centre with an emphasis on biology.

The $200 million Kerala project, with World Bank assistance, is part of the Kerala Startup Mission's flagship programme.

"The ETH initiative will be implemented in the PPP mode (public-private partnership) with an investment of about Rs 350 crore on a three-acre land in Thiruvananthapuram Technocity. Investors and institutions from all over the world are invited to invest in this new venture, "the Chief Minister said.

Several agreements were signed during the inaugural session of the three-day event. The Chief Minister interacted directly with the start-ups and investors before delivering the inaugural address.

The Chief Minister described the growth of the Kerala start-up ecosystem since 2016. He said that more than 6,100 start-ups, more than 62,000 job opportunities, investment of Rs 5,800 crore, all these prove the strength of the state's entrepreneurial system and since early-stage investment of start-ups is essential, HNIs in the state should come forward to set up angel funds on the lines of Kerala Angel Network and Malabar Angel Network.

Finally, while Artificial Intelligence (AI) is opening doors to new opportunities, we need to continuously explore the possibilities of finding solutions to the societal problems of AI.