Infinity, the city’s first intelligent building, in Saltlec

Capacity creation with an eye on tomorrow’s demand is today’s strategy in the state’s IT hub. Infinity Parks, which came up with the city’s first intelligent building in Salt Lake Electronics Complex (Saltlec), is rolling out another ambitious project in July.

Infinity Benchmark envisages the setting up of an 18-storeyed tower, comprising an entire gamut of elements, including car-parking facility, food courts, restaurants, stylised hawkers’ corner, business equipment arcade, business club and office space.

“These are all services to match international standards and we feel the demand for these facilities will pick up in the coming days. We are bullish about the project, as the inquiries on availability of space in Calcutta are constantly growing. In the next 12 to 18 months, the demand will rise further,” predicts Ravindra Chamaria, chairman, Infinity Group.

Webel, responsible for creating enabling infrastructure in Sector V, has already allotted the land for the Rs 80-crore project, behind Infinity and beside the Siemens complex. An 18-month time-line has been set for the mixed-use project.

“The demand for services as well as space in Saltlec justifies such projects and we want them to roll it out in a time-barred manner,” says S.K. Mitra, managing director, Webel.

The state government’s nodal IT agency has an equity participation in Infinity Parks, which was first promoted by Bikram Dasgupta and later bought over by Chamaria, an NRI businessman with interests in real estate.

According to the plan drawn up for Infinity Benchmark — to be financed with a combination of internal accruals and borrowings from financial institutions — the first six floors will have 30,000 sq ft of space each, while the seventh to 18th floors will have 25,000 sq ft on each floor.

“Parking is a major problem in Saltlec, which we think will aggravate in the days ahead. We are creating a multi-level parking facility in the basement and the second to the fifth floor to accommodate 500 vehicles,” adds Chamaria.

The ground floor will have restaurants, food courts and a hygiene hawker centre — a la Singapore — and banks. To address the working needs of companies in Sector V, the first floor will have a full-fledged computer and office equipment market.

Entertainment will not be restricted to the food alone. “The sixth floor will be a business club, with a pub and a health centre to give people an opportunity to chill out. The club will have conferencing facility as well,” says Chamaria.

The top 12 floors will be for IT and IT-enabled services companies, with the rent pegged at around Rs 25 per sq ft, apparently Rs 10 lower than the prevailing rates in Infinity and some of the other buildings in the area.

“The services in Infinity are bundled and that’s why the rates are a little higher. But the feedback from the market is that some of the companies are not interested in all the benefits and they want cheaper rates. So, we will segregate some of the facilities and offer them to willing clients only,” signs off Chamaria.