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Hans India
09-06-2025
- Business
- Hans India
The Sona Story: The textile to tech journey of industrialist C Valliappa
Bengaluru: In the pantheon of India's IT revolution, few real estate addresses are as iconic as Sona Towers on Bengaluru's Millers Road. And fewer still are the stories as quietly powerful as that of the man behind it—C. Valliappa, the Chettiar industrialist whose foresight laid the very foundations for what would become India's Silicon Valley moment. Chitra Narayanan's 'The Sona Story' by Bloomsbury captures this remarkable journey with depth, subtlety and a strong narrative pulse. At the heart of the book lies the gripping account of how Valliappa, a textile magnate with no prior experience in commercial real estate, constructed Sona Towers with unwavering commitment to quality. In 1984, Texas Instruments (TI), the American semiconductor giant, chose this building to house India's first offshore software development centre using remote uplink using a satellite dish atop Sona Towers—a landmark event that catalysed India's software exports and tech services boom. With its wind-tested structures, earthquake-resistant foundation, and uninterrupted power supply, Sona Towers was years ahead of its time. As Nandan Nilekani, co-founder of Infosys, notes in his advance praise, 'Mr Valliappa was the first entrepreneur to work with a global multinational like Texas Instruments to put up India's first remote software development centre using a satellite dish.' His efforts also unlocked a wave of government support, including the STPI programme, further fuelling Bengaluru's ascent as a global tech hub. What makes the book especially compelling is its multidimensional portrayal of Valliappa—not just as a businessman, but as a compassionate human being. Whether it's his refusal to let a tenant compromise his ethics or his focus on philanthropic efforts in education, healthcare, and rural development, the portrait that emerges is of a man who blended Vyaparam (enterprise) with Dharmam (giving). As Bhaskar Bhat, former MD of Titan, housed at Sona Towers in its early years, reflects, Valliappa's life 'will go a long way in helping budding entrepreneurs conduct themselves through life.' And IM Kadri, the architect of Sona Towers, aptly calls it 'a delightful and inspiring journey.'
Hans India
05-06-2025
- Business
- Hans India
The Sona Story: The Textile to Tech Journey of Chettiar Industrialist C. Valliappa
Bengaluru: In the pantheon of India's IT revolution, few real estate addresses are as iconic as Sona Towers on Bengaluru's Millers Road. And fewer still are the stories as quietly powerful as that of the man behind it—C. Valliappa, the Chettiar industrialist whose foresight laid the very foundations for what would become India's Silicon Valley moment. Chitra Narayanan's 'The Sona Story' by Bloomsbury captures this remarkable journey with depth, subtlety and a strong narrative pulse. At the heart of the book lies the gripping account of how Valliappa, a textile magnate with no prior experience in commercial real estate, constructed Sona Towers with unwavering commitment to quality. In 1984, Texas Instruments (TI), the American semiconductor giant, chose this building to house India's first offshore software development centre using remote uplink using a satellite dish atop Sona Towers—a landmark event that catalysed India's software exports and tech services boom. With its wind-tested structures, earthquake-resistant foundation, and uninterrupted power supply, Sona Towers was years ahead of its time. As Nandan Nilekani, co-founder of Infosys, notes in his advance praise, 'Mr Valliappa was the first entrepreneur to work with a global multinational like Texas Instruments to put up India's first remote software development centre using a satellite dish.' His efforts also unlocked a wave of government support, including the STPI programme, further fuelling Bengaluru's ascent as a global tech hub. What makes the book especially compelling is its multidimensional portrayal of Valliappa—not just as a businessman, but as a compassionate human being. Whether it's his refusal to let a tenant compromise his ethics or his focus on philanthropic efforts in education, healthcare, and rural development, the portrait that emerges is of a man who blended Vyaparam (enterprise) with Dharmam (giving). As Bhaskar Bhat, former MD of Titan, housed at Sona Towers in its early years, reflects, Valliappa's life 'will go a long way in helping budding entrepreneurs conduct themselves through life.' And IM Kadri, the architect of Sona Towers, aptly calls it 'a delightful and inspiring journey.' The book is gripping, grounded, and full of quiet revelations. A very honest glimpse into how one man's foresight created a launchpad for big tech dreams. Lovely read, and worth finding a permanent place on bookshelves. For those interested in entrepreneurship, technology, and the soul of Indian business, The Sona Story is a rich and rewarding read. By Chitra Narayanan | Published by Bloomsbury India Rs 499
Indian Express
27-05-2025
- Business
- Indian Express
Textile and IT tycoon C Valliappa's biography is a valuable addition to the genre of business journalism
Early in his career, C Valliappa, a business tycoon well-known in South India, walked into his father's office in his financial company and sat down without realising the chain of command he had just broken. 'Look, here's your new managing director,' his father joked, making Valliappa realise that his rise to the top would not be as nepotistic as he expected. He would have to, in today's corporate-speak, drill down — on pretty much everything. The story of his life has been detailed in a new biography The Sona Story: The Textile to Tech Journey of Chettiar Industrialist C Valliappa (Bloomsbury) by business journalist Chitra Narayanan. The book explores how his family was responsible for bolstering the Information Technology movement in Bengaluru, filling gaps in college-level technical education in South India and recovering from the end of a legacy business in textiles after conflicts with labour unions. The book is a little scattered, its non-linear flow getting in the way of the in-depth research and reportage the author has clearly done, but it is a valuable contribution to the genre of business biography for laypeople and experts alike. The book begins with well-wishers and family members recalling the building, Sona Towers, in Bengaluru that became the first to house a satellite office in India, for Dallas-based Texas Instruments. A building that would go on to house many more multi-national IT companies like Verifone, Oracle and Cisco, Narayanan chooses the right quotes by business and political veterans like Nandan Nilekani, Montek Singh Ahluwalia and Srini Rajam to indicate just how big of a deal it was in the 1970s and 1980s for a US-based company to have foreign employees in India making software for consumption abroad. The building needed to have a very particular construction as well as the availability of a wind map so Texas Instruments could confidently set up a satellite — and it did, an achievement possible in equal part due to Valliappa's interest in architecture and him rising to a challenge by his father to make an office building wider than one made by him. Growing labour costs in the '90s and the withdrawal of government subsidies, particularly in power, dented the family's textile business to an extent where it was ultimately irrecoverable. There were also conflicts with labour unions, stoked partly by Janata Dal leader HD Deve Gowda, that were handled with varying success. Despite attempts to cut costs by importing foreign machines to speed up production and multiple meetings with the labour unions, the mills were shut down in 1999. Valliappa's personal life and interests are also part of the book, particularly his college days as a student leader in which he crossed paths with political and cultural figures like CN Annadurai, Dr S Radhakrishnan, Periyar, MS Subbulakshmi and Sadasivam, as well as anecdotes of his father sending him away from home at the age of 23 to prove his business acumen. Other stories, like that of the surgery that recovered his voice, his interactions with his sons and wife, and his love for Tamil literature, could have shone better if arranged in juxtaposition to the businesses he helmed every day for six decades.
