By Divina Ann Philipose, Bharat Hegde & Manasi Nene
Bengaluru and Technology are almost synonymous with each other; the bustling city is at the heart of India’s technology prowess, with major global and Indian conglomerates, legacy companies and startups, all finding a home here. And that this happened is no accident. Several different state governments & the city of Bengaluru itself have created the necessary incentives and infrastructure to make this happen. One such infrastructural commodity that has been at the centre of this journey, has been Tech Parks.
These hubs—essentially massive office complexes—house thousands of employees, and some of the biggest Tech Parks have hundreds of thousands employed with the different companies which have offices there. For instance, ~150,000 employees work at Manyata Tech Park, for companies like Philips, Rolls Royce, IBM, Larsen & Toubro and many more.
But with the COVID-19 induced lockdowns coming into place, a large number of employees went back to their hometowns, and more and more companies shifted to a flexible or work-from-home setting. This, in turn, impacted the Tech Parks, with several having shut down, and others still struggling to fill in their capacity. But there’s a larger, more widespread impact that the shuttering of these Tech Parks have.
There are hundreds of smaller businesses in and around Tech Parks that have been severely impacted. From your local tea stalls and restaurants to travel agencies and housing accommodations like PGs, hundreds of businesses are struggling to get back on their feet, with a fair number having shut shop. Divina Ann Philipose, Manasi Nene and Bharat Hegde went to visit some of these businesses, and shed light on the impact of the lockdowns on the micro-economies around Tech Parks.
