Microsoft Corporation has chosen Bangalore, the silicon valley of India, for its first-ever exclusive and independent educational venture in the world. The university may train around 1000 students and may well be India’s first ever university run by a multinational company. Although Microsoft has a special focus on higher education initiatives in other countries, but India will be the first country where it would have a wholly-owned university.
According to the sources of Timesofindia, A couple of months ago, a team from Microsoft approached the Karnataka government with a proposal and conducted another project presentation at Microsoft headquarters in Redmond, US. Microsoft will now come back with a formal request and proposal with details on the project outlay, land required to set up the university, via-media (a society, trust or another alternative entity) to enter the country’s education industry as a direct partner, courses to be offered, number of students to be trained and the nature of Microsoft’s contribution to manpower development in the country.
IT/BT secretary M N Vidyashankar told Timesofindia
“Negotiations are on. Microsoft is in the process of drawing up a road map and deciding on the via media for the project. Ultimately, the high level co-ordination committee headed by chief minister H D Kumaraswamy will evaluate the project and take a final decision.”
Apart from the approval from Chief Minister, Microsoft will also require clearances from the HRD ministry and the UGC.
