According to global reports, Hyderabad has emerged to be the most dynamic city in the world in terms of its performance in socio-economic and commercial real estate categories. It is heartening to note that despite the overall economic slowdown, 7 Indian cities managed to bag their place in this year’s ranking of the top 20 cities globally. Bengaluru has achieved the second rank, Chennai stands at fifth, and Delhi has been ranked sixth in the list of 130 cities across the world.
The reports laid down Pune, Kolkata, and Mumbai as the 12th, 16th, and 20th top cities in the world, respectively. This index combines socio-economic and commercial property metrics to identify the most dynamic city economies and real estate markets across the world. The report mentioned that Hyderabad has been assessed as the world’s most dynamic city amongst 130 cities all over the globe. The range of economic indicators that were taken into account includes GDP growth, retail sales and airport passenger growth among others. Last year, Bengaluru had topped the list, followed by Hyderabad.
Vital aspects worth noting
Experts observe that India’s fastest-growing cities have attracted the attention of overseas investors to a considerable degree. One can see the benefits of the government’s reforms as far as infrastructure and the policy front are concerned. The decelerations in economic growth notwithstanding, these reforms have managed to pave the way for more market transparency, which in turn boosts investments flowing into real estate. Industry insiders also assert that when it comes to south Indian cities, the commercial real estate segment is growing at a rapid pace. Hyderabad as well as Bengaluru has witnessed incredible growth in 2019. If we talk about the former, the city has readily opened its doors for technology-driven economic growth and ushered in large tech giants and e-commerce players, including Apple, Amazon, Google, and Facebook.
The state government has, in recent times, stressed on pro-business policies and high-quality infrastructure along with the availability of quality talent pools and top-notch business parks. These factors have lent a competitive edge to the city. The reports also threw light on the fact that Asia-Pacific hosts three-fourth of the world’s top 20 cities, which are considered to be the most dynamic urban centers in the world. The results have revealed a continued shift in global influence from west to east, with the top positions being claimed by Indian, Chinese and Vietnamese cities. Another encouraging aspect of this report is that several cities in the top 20 make their presence felt as they transform their urban environments in order to minimize carbon footprints. In fact, Hyderabad has adopted a solution-centric stance in the form of seeking ways to bring down the demand for air conditioning by spreading awareness about cool roofs that reflect sunlight and absorb less heat.
What else should you know?
Another positive step is targeted at the growth of micro-mobility. Hyderabad’s introduction of smart bikes and the rising popularity of electric vehicles (e-autos, in this case) clearly manifest this. Attributing the momentum to a prosperous technology sector, the report also stated that Hyderabad recorded the highest office net absorption in 2019 as compared to any city globally, and it also features amongst the world’s best-performing cities for prime office rental growth. In 2019, 17% of the total absorption that took place in India fell into Hyderabad’s lap, with Delhi and Bengaluru’s shares being about 9% and 8% respectively.
The parameters for the momentum index, while determining the ranks of the cities, took into account rate of absorption, rents and supply in a city’s real estate market, besides other factors such as ‘engine room’ population, air connectivity, presence of corporate headquarters and so on. The reports, however, also harp upon the glaring challenges of unchecked construction that has led to haphazard and uneven development in many of the top 20 cities worldwide. The maximum development has been concentrated in the western side of Hyderabad, resulting in severe congestion and bottlenecks. The report also highlighted how effective measures need to be implemented to tackle congestion and enable more balanced growth.
The robust nature and the boom in the realty sector of Hyderabad have also been emphasized by various other reports related to real estate and office space absorption that were recently released. It is also noteworthy that when the state of Telangana came into being in 2014, Hyderabad had not even featured in the list of 20 most dynamic cities in the world. Eventually over the years, the city improved its rankings to claim the top spot. IT Minister KT Rama Rao has given an assurance that investments will continue to pour in and that the boom in commercial real estate is here to stay, thanks to the focus on business expansion which will be strengthened by innovation policies like TS-IPASS. He further added that as far as socio-economic development goals are concerned, Hyderabad will continue to be at the forefront. He also mentioned that he will flaunt the report at the upcoming World Economic Forum in Davos, to showcase Hyderabad’s achievements, which according to him, is at par with cities such as Shenzhen and Shanghai when it comes to creating an innovation-led economy.
