White elephant? Infosys to spend Rs 60 crore to build world’s tallest clock tower in Mysore campus

February 2, 2016, NewsCrunch

Infosys is building the world’s tallest free-standing clock tower in its Mysore campus at a cost of about Rs 60 crore.

The news comes amidst reports that due to a slowdown in the hiring of freshers, the Mysorecampus is being underutilised.

The Economic Times reported that the proposed 135-metre clock tower, which will sport digital screens on all four sides, will take 20 months to complete.

It has been designed by Hafeez Contractor, the Mumbai architect who also designed Infosys' Mysuru campus.

Infosys built its 345­-acre global education centre in Mysore at a cost of about Rs 1,700 crore. The campus, often described as the world’s largest corporate university, can train 15,000 trainees at any given time.

In 2013, Deccan Herald had quoted  an unnamed company source claiming that largest training facility in the campus, the GlobalEducationCenter (GEC II), was vacant due to the absence of new employees.

As the company had significant maintenance cost, including a monthly electricity bill of Rs 45 lakh, it wanted to monetise the centre by allowing employees of other firms to be trained.

Whatever the temporary fluctuations in hiring, everyone in the Indian IT industry agrees say the future lies in getting away from the business model that originated in body shopping.

As the shift unfolds, unless Infosys repurposes its Mysore campus, it may have to bear the burden of carrying along a white elephant.

The Economic Times suggested that clock tower was Infy founder Narayana Murthy’s brainchild.

It quoted him saying the Mysoretraining centre was "incomplete without a clock tower".

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