Uber starts bike-sharing service in Hyderabad

Source: The Economic Times, Dt: 30.1.2017

HYDERABAD: Cab aggregator Uber today commenced operations of uberMOTO, its bike-sharing product, in Hyderabad. 

The launch of the product was announced at an event held at T-Hub here last month in the presence of Travis Kalanick, Founder and CEO, and K T Rama Rao, Telangana Cabinet Minister for IT, Industries & Commerce. 
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Driver partners of uberMOTO were taken through a training session on various road safety related topics by representatives from the RTO before the starting their first trip, the company said in a statement. 

Kalanick was quoted as saying, "It's (uberMOTO) a quick, easy and affordable way to get around the city. And it's great to be working with a progressive, forward thinking government like Telangana on smart mobility solutions that can help reduce congestion in urban areas." 

Rama Rao said, "We recently achieved the top spot in ease of doing business in India which is a testament to our strong belief in making Telangana a start-up leader in India. 

"Uber has added another feather in our partnership today by launching uberMOTO to help solve the transportation and congestion problems for people in Hyderabad and I am hopeful that this service will help people in reaching their destination quickly and conveniently." 

JLL: Hyderabad fifth most dynamic city in the world

Source: The Hindu   Dt:18.01.2017

Hyderabad, the City of Pearls , has made it to the top 10 most dynamic cities across the world chosen by JLL City Momentum Index (CMI) 2017. It has been placed fifth with Bangalore on top of the list.

 

Other cities that made to the list are: Ho chi Minh City (2-Vietnam), Silicon valley (3-USA), Shanghai ((4-China), London (6-UK), Austin (7-USA), Hanoi (8-Vietnam), Boston (9-USA) and Nairobi (10-Kenya).

 

According to the index released by the Chicago-based cities research centre, JLL measures population, connectivity, technology, research & development, education, construction, real estate investment and property prices as the main criteria for choosing the most dynamic cities.

 

The JLL index says that a city's capacity to embrace rapid change determines its ability to compete in the world – today and in the future. "The overriding factors that characterise the world's most dynamic cities are technology and innovation and cities that best absorb, adapt and leverage these drivers come out on top", adds the report.

 

Although the most dynamic cities are spread across the world, more than half of the top 30 in the 2017 ranking are in Asia-Pacific. Bangalore, India's technology centre, has taken the number one spot. In fact, India snatched the lead from China as home to some of the world's fastest-changing cities, taking six of the top 30, compared with China's five.

 

"Liveability is also surfacing as an increasingly important driver of momentum, as it is key to attracting talent. Affordability and space constraints in San Francisco (21) contributed to knocking that city out of the top 20 for the first time and Hong Kong out of the top 30. The environment is also becoming a more critically determining factor in the index. Although in the top 30, Delhi (23) and Beijing (15) were hindered by poor environmental scores", says the JLL CMI. JLL is a financial and professional services firm specialising in commercial real estate services and investment management.

Hyderabad to witness highest supply of shopping malls in 2017

Source: Realty.Economic Times Dt: 5.1.2017

NEW DELHI: Eight shopping malls spanning 2.6 million square feet are expected to become operation in Hyderabad in 2017, according to a recent report by Cushman & Wakefield. The city will see highest supply of malls this year.

While these malls would be spread across the city, majority of the malls would be seen in the north-west quadrant in locations such as Kondapur, Gachibowli and Chandanagar.
Anshul Jain, Managing Director, India, Cushman & Wakefield said, "Retail mall spaces have, in recent times, seen interest from institutional investors which is providing an additional boost to developers to take up retail malls space building. Further, once India also starts listing REITs, quality retail spaces will be seen as a viable mid to long term investment asset for investors. This has further enhanced the attractiveness of retail mall spaces for developers. This is perhaps the reason why 2017 is expected to see nearly double the amount of retail space as against 2016."

Following closely, Chennai will witness five shopping malls getting operational spanning over 2.5 million square feet during 2017. Most of the supply is likely to be in seen in peripheral locations such as Vandalur, Navalur, while two of the malls will become operational in Velachery during the year.

Upcoming shopping mall supply in 2017:

Telangana Information Technology Association inaugurates incubation centre in Hyderabad

Source: Indian Express, PTI ., Dt: 24.11.2016

Telangana Information Technology Association (TITA) inaugurated Telangana Innovation and Incubation Center (TIIC) in Hyderabad on Thursday. The inauguration of the first Techno Rural Startup Incubation Center took place at Rajiv Gandhi University of Knowledge Technologies IIIT Basar campus, a release said.

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The Vice Chancellor Sirasani Sathyanarayana and TITA Global President Sundeep Kumar Makthala together inaugurated the centre.

"The TIIC will enable and support all the students of IIIT and youth around the village to transform their potential ideas into startups, it will support in the form of mentoring, funding, ideation, and knowledge support," TITA said.

IIIT Basara and TITA had signed an MoU to support creating the startup ecosystem in IIIT Basar, entrepreneurship with business plans along with the prototype infrastructure.

Japan-based SafeTraceHub, multimedia firm Prism Multimedia, and the US-based Adsidious have shown interest and given consent to extend their services in TIIC.

IIIT and TITA, through TIIC, would be working partners in major projects undertaken by the Government of Telangana as well as the Central government.

"TITA is planning to establish Telangana Incubation and Innovation Centers in all the universities and colleges across Telangana to encourage new startups at college level," TITA President Makthala said.

"The mandate of TIIC would be to generate a free flow of ideas and their implementation, in both directions of the constituent partners – RGUKT and TITA. The TIIC would help students to generate startups resulting from selected ideas. These start-ups would lead to generating more employment opportunities for the rural youth of the region," it said.

While the technical and legal support for the TIIC would be provided by TITA and its recognised channel partners, Rajiv Gandhi University of Knowledge Technologies (RGUKT) would provide the requisite infrastructure support – like working spaces, electricity, water, networking, bandwidth etc.

"The work at TIIC would be selectively permitted to be utilised as a part of the mandatory project work for students, under the guidance of recognised faculty of RGUKT and TITA experts. It was also agreed that a steering committee would be set up comprising of members from TITA as well as faculty of RGUKT…," said IIIT Basar Vice Chancellor Sathyanarayana.

In TIIC, start-ups can be established in digital media, IOT, solar energy, smart cities, telecom services, mobile technologies, cloud analytics, healthcare, robotics, learning management system, artificial intelligence etc, it added.

World’s second biggest sitting statue coming up near Hyderabad

Source: The Hindu, 10.12.2016

Tribute to Ramanujacharya at the start of 1000th birth anniversary celebrations

A complex with 108 temples and a towering 216-feet-high sitting statue of 10th century Bhakti saint Ramanuja is taking shape on the outskirts of Hyderabad.

Called the Statue of Equality as a tribute to Ramanujacharya’s philosophy and teachings, the gigantic structure will mark the beginning of the 1000th birth anniversary celebrations of the religious guru, planned by Chinna Jeeyar Swamy and his religious trust.
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“The first phase of the project involving the statue will be ready by November next year and costs about Rs. 250 crore, which has come in the form of donations. The whole project, including the temple complex and the digital sound and light show at the base of the statue, is estimated to cost Rs. 1,000 crore,” said CEO of the project S.M. Balasubramanyam, who is a former head of the Endowments Department.

At Muchintal village

As workers pour concrete into the base of the structure, which is called the bhadrapeeta, a glimpse of the grandeur and magnificence of the project can be seen from the 54-feet high multi-storied structure on which the statue will come up in Muchintal village, a few miles from the Hyderabad International Airport at Shamshabad.

“The statue and the temple complex is the brainchild of Chinna Jeeyar Swamy. It will be the second highest sitting statue in the world [the tallest is the Great Buddha in Thailand at 302 ft]. From the ground to the tip of the staff, it is going to be 216 feet,” informs Yellapragada Suryanarayana of the trust which is executing the project.

The base of three-storied building is ready. “The containers with the pieces for the statue are reaching the Chennai port from China in the next few days and we have created accommodation and working space for about 60 specialist Chinese workers, engineers and welders who will assemble the statue,” says Mr. Suryanarayana.

700 tonnes of panchaloha

“We created a 3D digital scaled image, which was supervised by Chinna Jeeyar Swamy to the minutest detail. This was sent to Aerosun Corporation and they have used it to create 1,500 pieces that can be assembled into the statue. The biggest and the heaviest segment is the face which is a 24 ft by 24 ft piece. We have been promised that there will be no welding marks on the statue,” says sthapathi Prasad, who is supervising the work with adherence to spiritual traditions.

Nanjing-based Aerosun Corporation, which has an Art Statue Division, has shaped 700 tonnes of panchaloha into the gigantic statue of the Bhakti saint, right down to the sagging ear-lobes. The statue will be sited on a lotus held up by 36 massive elephants. Within the statue will be a concrete core around which will be the panchaloha sheet, varying in thickness between 10 mm and 20 mm.

Visible from flights

“The statue will be visible from the flights landing and taking off from Shamshabad Airport. We are expecting a similar announcement like the one made in the air [when flights have a view] near Amritsar on the Golden Temple,” says Mr. Suryanarayana.

It is a perfect message for the egalitarian seer Ramanuja, who preached that spiritual bliss is available for all human souls irrespective of their birth.

Demonetisation to strengthen the real estate sector – CREDAI Hyderabad

Source: Siasat 29.11.16

Hyderabad: 29th November, 2016: Confederation of Real Estate Developers Association of India (CREDAI) Hyderabad today announced that the real estate industry fully supports the decision of the government to demonetise currency notes. The Credai Hyderabad members welcomed the Union government's decision to put the halt on black money.

Almost 95% of the Hyderabad market consists of mid segment housing, whose pricing ranges from Rs. 25 lakhs to Rs. one crore. The buyers in this segment are mostly employees, whose income ranges from Rs. 25,000 to Rs. 2 lakhs. They essentially pay the housing instalments from their savings and the bank loans, they get from Banks. Therefore, there is hardly any cash component in their transactions with the developers. In the absence of cash component, the demonetisation has no effect on prices of residential housing or other housing. Similarly, over the years the Hyderabad real estate developers have been accessing the necessary capital from the Banks. Almost all the real estate developers, who are the members of CREDAI and who contribute 85% of the Hyderabad real estate market, undertake real estate development on the lands taken from the landowners under a joint development agreement. Therefore, there is no financial transaction between the developer and the landowner, much less the cash transaction.

Demonetisation is likely to improve government tax collection by broadening the tax base and enabling them to take up development and infrastructure projects on a war footing and boost the growth of the economy. The government would also be in a position to fast track the initiatives such as AMRUT, Housing for All by 2022, Development of 100 Smart Cities etc. leading to significant job creation. This influx of money into the monetary system will also put more money into the pocket of home purchasers through lower tax burden and incentives for home ownership.

The Real Estate sector will witness a major change in 2017 with the introduction of RERA Bill in May 2017 and implementation of the GST regime in April 2017. In view of the several requirements of the RERA Act, the real estate developers will be constrained to take up smaller and limited number of real estate projects. In view of this change the supply of real estate products will come down, while the demand continues to increase in Hyderabad. The gap between demand and supply will increase and consequently the availability of housing units will be less. Therefore, the prices of housing units will increase, once the RERA comes into effect from May 2017 and consequently the prices will tend to increase.

The GST is likely to be introduced from April 2017. Presently the service tax paid on services and others are given a set off against the service tax payable by the developers/homebuyer. Thereby, there is less incidence of service tax on the cost of the housing unit. This facility will not be available once the GST regime comes into effect from April 2017. Consequently, there will be more incidence of service tax on the cost of the project. Further with the introduction of GST the rate service tax will be higher at 18%, compared to 5.5%, which is now applicable. Thus, the real estate prices will increase as a consequence of introduction of GST from April 2017.

According to Mr. S Ram Reddy, President, CREDAI Hyderabad, "We believe that the demonetisation is an initiative to cleanse the economy and make it growth focused. It will be good for the overall economy as the unaccounted cash transactions would also become a part of the mainline economy and provide government more tax inflows enabling them to take up mega infrastructure projects and steer the growth. The banking and financial system will also be plush with funds to provide credit to the industry at a lower rate of interest, thereby spurring the economic growth and creating more jobs. This will give a major impetus to the real estate sector, as more jobs and lower interest rates are likely to encourage end users to purchase their dream homes."

He further added that, "Hyderabad real estate market is driven by the end user demand. The present prices for real estate in Hyderabad are the lowest amongst all the metros with no influence of any speculative operators. The funding by the home buyers is mainly through loans from banks and financial institutions which are all regulated entities. As such, cash deals are not a part of the real estate transactions by our members. All organized developers adhere to strict business principles and maintain complete transparency in the transactions. We have been sourcing funds from banks and Financial Institutions and have not been dealing in cash transactions over the last 5 to 6 years Therefore there will not be any impact on the real estate sector and the prices will remain stable. The much awaited RERA bill will come inforce from May 2017. The effect of RERA is going to be that there would be short supply of housing stock in the market and as a consequence of this shortage, the real estate prices will go up. Also, the effect of a GST coming into effect from April 2017 is that the prices would increase on account of non-availability of a service tax set off as well as increase in the rate of tax rate. So we are of the opinion that for Hyderabad, the demonetisation will have no impact on current real estate prices, but with the introduction of GST & RERA bill the prices will go up. So the home buyers in the city should not delay and purchase a property now."

According to Mr. P Ramakrishna Rao, General Secretary, CREDAI Hyderabad" The real estate sector is in a revival mode and already the implementation of RERA has brought a lot of confidence amongst the buyers. The demonetisation is a positive move. With this, banks are going to have additional funds hence, a fall in interest rates is expected. An early sign is seen with country's largest lender State Bank of India cutting its deposit rates by 1.75 per cent. This would be followed by reduction in lending rates and thereby bring down the EMI for the ultimate consumers and improving their eligibility. This will help drive growth and development in the sector. The Real Estate sector is a significant contributor to the national GDP (approx. 7% ) and is a second largest employment generator and will continue to be the main driving force for the growth of the economy."

He further added that, "The Secondary markets, where there is a prevalence of cash transactions might be affected as unaccounted cash payment would no longer take place leading to some dips in the sale process for assets that are sold or purchased in the short term. However, with the progress of time, it will not be surprising to see prices go up as sellers come to terms with the fact that capital gains tax has to be paid on monies, Sellers are likely to factor that into the sale price. Overall we can expect to witness positive reforms and sales growth in the housing sector. This is a win-win situation for developers and home buyers".

The move will have overall positive impacts on the sector. It will bring much needed efficiency, Transparency & affordability which are integral premises for a welfare state and full fledged development of the economy.

REAL ESTATE WILL BOOM AGAIN

Last few days there has been a surge of messages from "Whatsapp Economists" with the simple theme that real estate prices will fall drastically due to Demonetisation ie ban on Rs 500/Rs 1000 notes.

Here's a few Point Summary of what actual experts with business and economic logic say

1. Demonetization will flood the Banking system with funds driving down both interest rates on Deposits and Loans

2. If Interest rate on FD is just 5-6 % interest on Home Loans will come down to 7-8 % (since Banks keep an 2-3 per cent margin).

3. Historically at such Low interest rates Real Estate industry gets a massive boost as property becomes attractive to everyone: Buyers, Investors and even that invisible category called Businessmen/Professionals.

4. Even when prices are same, Apartments come within reach of Buyers due to lower EMI on Loans due to lower interest rate

5. Investors find Investing in property more attractive than earning a paltry 5-6 % on Bank Deposit as simply buying and renting out gives them more return. PLUS they create an asset and earn appreciation over a period of time PLUS they get income tax deductions

6. Shopkeepers, Retail Malls, Corporate Houses and even professionals like Doctors, Consultants, CA's jump in to buy property as they want preferred location and once that's gone they may never get that chance again. So, they buy at the first available opportunity instead of waiting for prices to fall.

7. Demonetization will see the most money flowing in banking system from people in the unorganized / small scale sector: Farmers, Traders, Tailors, Hoteliers, Beauty shop owners, Tuition classes, small contractors, House Maids, Drivers, Security Guards etc. Crores of new people entering Banking system means that they will also be eligible to get bank loans and fulfill their dream of owning a house

8. Government will have money to invest in infrastructure as Banks will deploy lakhs of crores in Government Securities. With a few lakh crore at its disposal, Government can only boost funding to infrastructure schemes such as Smart City Mission, Swacch Bharat Mission, Housing for All etc which will inturn boost real estate too and make foreign investors invest in a fast developing country.

9. New Airport in town, better connectivity to National/State Highway, Upgradation in City Transport all lead to increase in demand and prices of properties in the city's

10. It is interesting to note that real estate prices show slower rise in countries which have a fully ready infrastructure like USA, UK, Japan etc. Whereas in a developing countries like India, there is a vast difference in prices in a City before and after creation of Infrastructure

Conclusion:

In the final analysis, recent developments such as passing of Real Estate Regulation Act, Demonetization, Goods and Service Tax etc combined with Government focus on infrastructure will only serve as positive factors for growth of Real Estate industry

Factors of Real Estate Industry which get missed due to one-sided picture created by social media:

1. Real Estate Industry contributed 7 % to India's GDP.

2. Second Highest employer after Agriculture.

3. Real Estate Industry supports more than 140 allied industries from large ones such as Steel, Cement and Transport to cottage ones such as bamboo and rope making.

4. Real Estate Industry caters to the basic need of Shelter for every citizen.

5. As per Government of India, more than 90 per cent of demand for Real Estate Is in affordable and mid range category.

6. In era of mechanisation and automation, Real Estate is the only Industry which still continues to provide regular employment to millions of daily wage earners.

7. One of the only Industries which contributes large share of taxes at all levels of Government: Local Government ie Muncipal Corporations etc (Building permission charges), State Goverment (VAT and Stamp Duty), Central Government (Service Tax and Income Tax).

8. Investments such as equity shares, Commodities like Gold, Silver, Mutual Fund etc have seen large ups and downs. Real Estate is the only asset class which has given stable and constant one way growth over last several decades.

9. Real Estate has both value in use and value as investment.

10. Real Estate investment is the best investment from a very long term angle as taxation happens only on sale and in case of reinvestment 100 pc tax can be saved.

11. With Indian economy becoming increasingly urbanized, it is expected that more than 50 percent of India's population will live in cities by next decade. This massive change in demographic and economic profile of the country will give big boost to real estate over.

Omprakash : +919912043000

Hyderabad, TS, India