The trade and investment promotion wing of the British High Commission in India is planning to take up promotional campaigns to attract small and medium enterprises in the domestic information technology sector to set up operations in the United Kingdom.
At present, over 450 Indian companies have their offices in the UK. Out of these, 340 companies are in the information, communication and technology sector. This also includes big names like Wipro, TCS and Reliance.
The similarity in legal procedures and taxation policies had been the main driving force to lure Indian companies to set up UK operations, a source in the UK High Commission said.
He also added that Indian companies had found it easier to enter the UK market with English being the common official language in both the countries.
He said Indian companies were using the UK as a gateway from where they were exploring expansion of their operations to the whole of Europe, the High Commission sources said.
In 2003, India was the 8th largest investor in the UK in terms of number of projects. It was second after Japan among the Asian countries.
UK also has been the third largest investor in India after the US and Mauritius. Total investments made by the UK in India stood at Rs 897 crore (Rs 8.97 billion) in 2003.
In the first two months of 2004, the country invested around Rs 276 crore (Rs 2.76 billion) in India.
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