Chennai’s software parks exported ₹77,421 crore of services in 2023-24 through units registered with STPI. That makes Tamil Nadu fourth among states on this measure, well behind Karnataka, and the figure itself leaves out much of the city’s IT industry.
The numbers
Units registered with Software Technology Parks of India (STPI) in Tamil Nadu exported software and IT services worth ₹80,677.43 crore in 2023-24, the commerce ministry told the Lok Sabha in April 2025. That was 8.6% of the national STPI total of ₹9,43,312.66 crore and fourth among states, after Karnataka (₹4,09,095 crore), Maharashtra (₹1,83,848 crore) and Telangana (₹1,21,117 crore).
Almost all of Tamil Nadu’s figure is Chennai. The electronics and IT ministry’s December 2024 answer gives centre-wise exports: the Chennai centre accounted for ₹77,421.44 crore, or 96% of the state’s STPI exports, with Coimbatore a distant second at ₹2,548.26 crore.
What STPI figures cover
STPI is an autonomous society under the Union electronics and IT ministry. Since 1991 it has registered export-oriented software units under its Software Technology Park scheme, offering a single point for approvals and, historically, tax benefits, and it compiles export figures from those units. That is the key limitation: companies operating from Special Economic Zones (SEZs), including IT SEZs, report through the SEZ system rather than STPI, so their exports do not appear in these tables.
In Chennai, where large IT campuses sit in SEZs along the OMR corridor and at sites such as ELCOT’s, the STPI number is therefore a partial count. The parliamentary answers reviewed give no SEZ figure for Tamil Nadu, so the total is not available from these sources. STPI’s own Chennai page puts 2023-24 exports from its jurisdiction, which includes Puducherry, at ₹80,979 crore, about ₹302 crore more than the Tamil Nadu figure.
Centre by centre, five years
| STPI centre | 2019-20 | 2020-21 | 2021-22 | 2022-23 | 2023-24 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Chennai | 46,049.48 | 47,079.77 | 55,973.62 | 71,391.98 | 77,421.44 |
| Coimbatore | 697.79 | 921.20 | 1,288.37 | 2,009.00 | 2,548.26 |
| Trichy | 79.58 | 254.47 | 280.17 | 377.21 | 449.14 |
| Madurai | 92.20 | 93.51 | 142.07 | 185.20 | 255.18 |
| Tirunelveli | 1.81 | 4.24 | 2.97 | 5.56 | 3.70 |
Source: Ministry of Electronics and IT, Lok Sabha Starred Question No. 324, 18 December 2024, Annexure I (software exports, ₹ crore)
Chennai’s growth was uneven. Exports rose 2% in the pandemic year 2020-21, then 19% in 2021-22 and 28% in 2022-23 as global technology spending surged, before slowing to 8% in 2023-24. Over the four years the centre grew 68%. Coimbatore grew faster from a small base, multiplying 3.7 times, and Trichy more than five times, which fits the state’s push to spread IT jobs to tier-two cities, but together the smaller centres were still under 5% of the state total.
Share of Tamil Nadu’s 2023-24 STPI software exports from the Chennai centre alone (₹77,421 crore of ₹80,677 crore), calculated from the MeitY and commerce ministry answers.
Chennai against the other IT cities
In shares, the Chennai centre accounted for about 8.2% of India’s STPI-registered exports in 2023-24 and Bengaluru for about 43%. The comparison is kinder lower down: Coimbatore’s ₹2,548 crore was more than double Mysuru’s ₹1,029 crore and nearly five times Mangaluru’s ₹539 crore, making it one of the larger tier-two STPI centres in the south.
| STPI centre | 2023-24 exports (₹ crore) |
|---|---|
| Bengaluru | 4,07,088.72 |
| Hyderabad | 1,21,115.57 |
| Pune | 1,05,818.98 |
| Chennai | 77,421.44 |
| Mumbai | 76,564.55 |
Source: Ministry of Electronics and IT, Lok Sabha Starred Question No. 324, 18 December 2024, Annexure I
On this measure Chennai is fourth among cities, behind Bengaluru, Hyderabad and Pune and just ahead of Mumbai. The comparison carries the same SEZ caveat for every city, and the share of SEZ-based work differs from city to city, so the ranking is a ranking of STPI-registered exports, not of total IT output.
It’s often said Chennai is India’s second-largest IT export city.
The record shows By STPI-registered exports in 2023-24, Chennai ranked fourth, behind Bengaluru, Hyderabad and Pune. Including SEZ exports could change the order, but no official city-level total that does so was found.
New commitments and incubation
At the January 2024 Global Investors Meet, the Information Technology and Digital Services department signed MoUs worth ₹22,130 crore, 3.3% of the meet’s total; data centres and global capability centres were among the sectors the closing release highlighted. STPI Chennai runs a FinTech centre of excellence, FinBlue, set up in 2019 with 10,000 sq ft of plug-and-play space. As of January 2025 it had onboarded 61 start-ups, which reported 1,249 jobs and ₹73.04 crore of revenue.
The smallest centres show how hard dispersal is. Tirunelveli’s STPI exports were ₹3.70 crore in 2023-24, lower than the year before, and Madurai’s ₹255 crore was about a third of one per cent of Chennai’s. Plug-and-play space and incubation can seed companies, but the volume still follows talent pools, clients and airports, and in Tamil Nadu those remain concentrated around the capital.
Software against the state’s other big exports
Set beside manufacturing, the STPI figure is large. The same commerce ministry answer gives Tamil Nadu’s 2023-24 exports of motor vehicles as ₹25,069.92 crore and auto components as ₹20,168.65 crore, both first in India. Together, ₹45,238.57 crore, they come to a little over half the state’s STPI-registered software exports, before counting any SEZ-based IT work. For a state better known nationally for cars, services are already the larger export on these official counts.
STPI’s footprint in Tamil Nadu
STPI Chennai became operational in June 1995 and since August 1999 has covered Tamil Nadu, Puducherry and the Andaman and Nicobar Islands, with sub-centres at Coimbatore, Madurai, Puducherry, Tirunelveli and Trichy, according to its own page. Nationally STPI has 67 centres, 54 in tier-two and tier-three cities. The December 2024 answer lists 44,794 sq ft of raw incubation space and 151 plug-and-play seats at Chennai, and shows the FinBlue centre sanctioned ₹10.82 crore, of which ₹8.38 crore had been released and ₹6.13 crore used.
What this means for you
- STPI export figures are a floor for Chennai’s IT exports, not the total; SEZ-based campuses are counted elsewhere.
- Chennai’s growth slowed to 8% in 2023-24 after two strong years, a useful benchmark for hiring cycles in the city.
- Smaller Tamil Nadu centres are growing fast but together remain under 5% of the state’s STPI exports.
- Start-ups can approach STPI Chennai’s incubation facilities and FinBlue directly.
What to watch
Pending
2024-25 and 2025-26 centre-wise STPI export figures, typically disclosed in Parliament answers or STPI’s annual report.
Pending
Any official consolidated figure for Tamil Nadu’s SEZ software exports, which would allow a full count.
Checked against official sources on 23 October 2026. Figures and rules change; confirm on the linked official pages before relying on them.
Sources
- Lok Sabha Unstarred Question No. 5008, state-wise IT and automobile exports, 01.04.2025 (Ministry of Commerce and Industry)
- Lok Sabha Starred Question No. 324, Software Exports from Software Technology Parks, 18.12.2024 (Ministry of Electronics and IT)
- About STPI Chennai (Software Technology Parks of India)
- Press Release No. 051, Chief Minister’s address at GIM 2024 valedictory, 08.01.2024 (Government of Tamil Nadu)
- Press Release No. 056, Tamil Nadu Global Investors Meet 2024 outcomes, 08.01.2024 (Government of Tamil Nadu)
