Mangaluru: A Panel Discussion on “Smart City Mangaluru and Business Opportunities” was held at St Joseph Engineering College, Vamanjoor, Mangaluru on 15 th November 2018, under the bannerCOLLOQUY–18. The event was jointly organized by Department of Business Administration and Industry Interaction and Entrepreneurship Development Cell (IIEDC) of the college.

The panel discussion offered participants the scope of setting up business ventures in the wake of Mangaulru becoming a Smart city. Prof Lionel Aranha, Chartered Accountant and Advocate chaired the session consisting of Annappa Pai, Director of Ace Foods Pvt Ltd, Mangaluru and President of DSIA, CA Abdur Rahman Musba, Head-Finance of Cardolite Specialty Chemicals India LLP, MSEZ, Mr Norbert M Shenoy, Financial Consultant, Arunanjali Securities and Ms Sulaj Kini, Partner of Bell Paints, as panelists. Prof Lionel Aranha presented an overview of the growth of Mangaluru from a small town to a city. He highlighted upon the main strengths of the city in terms of infrastructure, educational services, banking services and quality of living.

In spite of having all the facilities, youngstersdon’t stay in Mangaluru. Mr Annappa Pai in his opening statement expressed that people of Mangaluru were always smart and now they are trying to make the city smart. Highlighting on the changes in the retail sector he classified it into door to door retailing, retailing at the signal, traditional neighborhood retailoutlets, supermarkets, hypermarket, online retail, WhatsApp and internet marketing.

CA Abdur Rahman Musba in his opening statement highlighted on the prime requirements necessary to set up large industries in Mangaluru, the principal criterion being land with quality soil and drainage facility. He mentioned about stable, continuous and quality power, quality of water and availability of materials. He stressed on the need to promote Mangaluru and market its locational advantage.

Ms Sulaj Kini, a second generation entrepreneur briefed about the growth of her family business set up by her father. She expressed her motivations for staying in Mangaluru. She opined that metro cities have reached saturation and there is life beyond your work which our city can offer. She encouraged students to venture into entrepreneurship. Mr Norbert M. Shenoy, reflected on the concept of smart city.

He expressed that Manguluru is characterized by remittance economy, event management companies and catering business. Banking, education and catering were the major successful services set up by the citizens of Mangaluru. He spoke about the opportunities available for youngsters, which lie in harnessing technologies like app development, platforms, Internet of Things, Artificial Intelligence andMachine Learning.

The opening statements were followed by discussions based on the queries raised by the audience. Dr Prakash Pinto, Dean of MBA, Mr Sathyendra Bhat, Chairperson of IIEDC and Dr Babitha Rohit, Coordinator, IIEDC were present for the event.