Shri Priyank Kharge, Hon’ble Minister for Home, IT & BT and e-Governance, Government of Karnataka: “Mangaluru is proving that Karnataka’s next wave of technology-led growth can come from beyond Bengaluru. With its talent, startups, growing GCC ecosystem and emerging strengths in deep tech, data centres and medtech, the city has the foundations to become Karnataka’s Silicon Beach. Our Beyond Bengaluru vision is about taking investment to where talent is, and Mangaluru is a powerful example of that vision taking shape. We now have an opportunity to build this into a globally connected technology ecosystem that creates companies, jobs and innovation from the coast.”
Spotlight @ Mangaluru Technovanza 2026:
Event Overview / Impact: Mangaluru Cements Its Place on Karnataka’s Tech Map as 700+ Delegates, 70 Startups, 60 GCCs Converge in Mangaluru Technovanza 2026
Ecosystem Strength: 300+ tech companies, 400+ startups and a 50,000+ technology workforce Anchor the Region
Growth Momentum: 60+ New Companies, 13,000+ Additional Jobs in 3 years and Grade-A Office Space Expansion Signal Long-Term Confidence
Focus Areas / Thematic Pillars: GCCs, Data Centres and Deep-Tech Take Centre Stage; Electronics, MedTech and Sustainable Urban Growth in Spotlight
Reports Launches: Launch of 2 Strategic Reports: Silicon Beach Skills Report 2026 Unveiled by Xpheno and AI Governance Report for Startups by Shardul Amarchand Mangaldas
Startup & Investor Ecosystem: K-Combinator Debuts with Cohort 1 Showcase; TiE Mangalore Leads Investor Engagement; Beyond Bengaluru BLUE Strengthens Ecosystem Outreach;12 Elevate winners recognised during the valedictory session
Key announcements: 5 New companies, 3 product launches and series of partnerships and investment-related outcomes were featured as part of the programme.
Rohith Bhat, Founder, wrkwrk, 99Games and Robosoft, was conferred the Digital Title 2026.
Mangalore, September 23, 2026: Karnataka’s technology economy is entering a decisive new phase with the state aiming to attract 500 more GCCs, generating $50 billion in economic output and 3.5 lakh jobs by 2029 – a target that was recently reaffirmed at KATALYST CONNECT by honorable Chief Minister D.K. Shivakumar. Crucially, this growth is no longer centred on Bengaluru alone. KDEM’s ‘Beyond Bengaluru’ mission spanning six clusters is working toward the state’s goal of $10 billion in IT services exports from these emerging hubs by 2030. Riding
against this accelerating momentum and state-wide distributed growth, Mangaluru — building on its own rising base of startups, GCCs and technology talent, today hosted Technovanza 2026.
Held at the TMA Pai International Convention Centre on 23 September, Mangaluru Technovanza 2026- The flagship initiative of the Karnataka Digital Economy Mission (KDEM) brought together 600 delegates, 70 startups, 60 global capability centres (GCCs), and over 20 investors – a staggering increase in scale from last year’s edition which reiterates the growing prominence and progress of the coastal region as a knowledge and innovation hub.
Mangaluru’s growing technology base was a key part of the ecosystem narrative. The city and surrounding region have 300+ tech companies, 400+ startups and a 50,000+ technology workforce. Over the last 36 months, the region has added 60+ new companies and 13,000+ workers, while more than 1 million sq. ft. of Grade-A office space is under construction. The ecosystem also benefits from 25+ engineering colleges, 15,000+ engineers graduating annually and 40,000+ graduates each year.
Sanjeev Kumar Gupta, CEO, Karnataka Digital Economy Mission (KDEM), said: “Addressing the inaugural ceremony, Mr Sanjeev Kumar Gupta, CEO, KDEM, said, “Mangaluru is one of only two ‘Silicon Beach’ destinations recognised globally. The world already sees us; now it is time for us to see the roadmap for ourselves. Our vision is to build a cluster with 200,000 tech jobs, ₹40,000 crore in tech exports, 4,000+ startups, 80+ GCCs and 10 Centres of Excellence, backed by a $10 billion coastal knowledge economy. This is not aspirational—it is already underway.”
He added, “Mangaluru’s strengths in safety, healthcare and quality of life, along with 15 GCCs, 102 global brand showrooms and a growing technology workforce, provide a strong foundation for this vision. With ₹35,000 crore in total exports, 35,000 on-site professionals and 20,000 working remotely, the ecosystem is scaling rapidly. Future is today—with a clear line of sight to what we can achieve.”
Setting the industry perspective and regional context, Rohith Bhat, Founder, wrkwrk, 99Games, and Robosoft, said: “Three years ago, a small group of us sat in a room and decided we wouldn’t wait for someone else to give this region its direction. We dreamed big: 2 lakh IT professionals, 4,000 startups, 5 unicorns, and a GDP leap from $20 billion to $100 billion — all by 2034. Today, that dream has roots. Startups have grown a third over, two homegrown companies have IPO’d in the last six weeks alone, and what started as a handful of passionate volunteers has become a movement — a Startup Accelerator backed by ₹9.5 crores in government support, an Angel network of 25 of our own writing the region’s first checks, and a hardware ecosystem taking shape with international partners. We know the gap between us and the world’s great ecosystems is still wide. But we are not waiting anymore — we are building the rails, one step at a time, toward the Prime Minister’s 2047 Viksit Bharat vision, further living up to the name we’ve given ourselves: the Silicon Beach”
Setting the Vision for Mangaluru as the Silicon Beach of India
The programme opened with the lamp-lighting ceremony, followed by “Future is Today” with Sanjeev Kumar Gupta, CEO, KDEM, and the Mangaluru Lead Anchor Address by Rohith Bhat. A fireside conversation featuring Ajay Vij, Senior Country Managing Director, Accenture India, and Richard Lobo, Chief People Officer, Tech Mahindra, moderated by Sanjeev Kumar Gupta, examined Mangaluru’s potential as a landing station in the GCC orbit and the role of enterprise and technology leadership in shaping the city’s next phase of growth.
The Guest of Honour Address by L.K. Atheeq, IAS (Retd.), Financial Advisor to the Chief Minister and Chairman, Bengaluru Business Corridor, focused on the State’s vision for the Mangaluru cluster. The Dialogue: Policy, Industry and Capital for Mangaluru brought together B.V. Naidu, Chairman, KDEM; Devdutt Yellurkar, General Partner, Charles River Ventures; and L.K. Atheeq, IAS (Retd.), moderated by Prashanth Shenoy, Co-Founder & CTO, UniCourt, to discuss the policy, industry and capital dimensions of the cluster’s growth.
“Emphasising the role of collective ecosystem, at the panel “Dialogue: Policy, Industry and Capital for Mangaluru”, B.V. Naidu, Chairman, Karnataka Digital Economy Mission (KDEM), said: “No ecosystem builds itself on government alone, or on corporates alone, or on institutions alone — it takes all three, working in tandem. And today, looking at Mangaluru, I measure our success against four yardsticks. First, the silicon beach brand itself has traveled — global corporates and VCs are showing up because they’ve seen the momentum. Second, our companies are getting acquired, which indicates the value being created locally. Third, our academic institutions are stepping in as extended partners putting their own funds behind centers of excellence. And fourth, when I see academia, finance and global industry all converging on this platform today- that itself is a testament that what we’re seeing now isn’t just growth — it’s the beginning of a snowball effect.”
Strategic Report Launches
The event also featured the launch of the Silicon Beach Skills Report 2026, developed with Xpheno, bringing the talent and skills landscape of the Udupi–Mangaluru cluster into the broader conversation on technology-led growth. The report tracks the evolution of the region’s talent ecosystem and its growing role as a Beyond Bengaluru technology cluster.
- 280K active accessible white-collar talent in the Silicon Beach region, up from 240K in 2025; talent with 1+ years’ experience grew 17% YoY to 105K.
- Mangaluru’s talent pool grew 20% YoY to 55K, while Udupi grew 14% to 22.5K; together, the two cities account for nearly 74% of the region’s experienced talent pool.
- IT/ITeS is the largest talent sector, with 24.5K professionals, recording 21% YoY growth; Engineering is the leading function at 16.5K.
- The top skill groups are Programming (25.6K; +26% YoY), Business Skills (22.3K; +23%) and Finance & Accounting (18.1K; +23%).
- Outbound jobseekers declined 20% to 29K, from 36.4K in 2025, while inbound jobseekers increased 3% to 24K, indicating changing talent mobility patterns in the cluster.
The AI Governance for Indian Startups Report, launched by Shardul Amarchand Mangaldas & Co., added a governance and responsible-innovation perspective to the programme. The report was formally launched during the main programme by Dr. Shardul Shroff, Founder & Executive Chairman, Shardul Amarchand Mangaldas & Co. The supplied event material identifies the report and its launch but does not provide specific findings; accordingly, no findings have been attributed to the report here. The report comes against the backdrop of Karnataka’s growing startup and DeepTech ecosystem and the increasing need for startups to balance AI-led innovation with trust, accountability, safety, privacy and compliance.
- Karnataka has 18,952+ registered startups, while Bengaluru ranked 10th among the world’s top 20 startup cities in the 2025 StartupBlink Index
- Bengaluru’s startup ecosystem attracted USD 71.19 billion in funding between 2014 and 2024, highlighting its position as a major venture-capital destination.
- The report sets out 8 principles covering fairness, grievance redressal, data protection & privacy, transparency, AI upskilling, safety & security, sustainability, and intellectual property protection.
- The principles are triangulated against key 2025 Indian frameworks, including the India AI Governance Guidelines, RBI’s FREE-AI Framework and SEBI’s consultation paper on responsible AI/ML usage, alongside other national and global guidelines.
Building the Mangaluru Ecosystem
Beyond the main-stage conversations, the programme included the launch of K-Combinator and a showcase of its Cohort 1 startups, Startup Policy Awareness, the Beyond Bengaluru Cluster Seed Fund and Silicon Beach Angels, Karnataka Acceleration Network (KAN), an Angel Investors’ Masterclass and international ecosystem conversations. The agenda also featured an announcement of the USISPF Coffee Table Book and a spotlight on ecosystem and technology initiatives.
Technovanza’s continued growth reflects the ambition to create a platform where government, industry, startups, investors and academia work together to strengthen Mangaluru’s technology ecosystem and open pathways for businesses and talent to scale from the region.