Karnataka to Roll Out Tourism Start-up Policy, Opening Sector to Innovation

The Karnataka Tourism Department will frame and implement a Tourism Start-up Promotion Policy to draw on the State's start-up ecosystem for developing new technologies, products and innovative solutions for the tourism sector, Tourism Minister K.J. George has said.

Outlining the scope of the proposed policy, Mr. George said areas that could be opened up for innovation include visitor experience, digital services, destination management, sustainable tourism, cleanliness, mobility, safety, accessibility, tourist information and locally rooted experiences.

According to details shared by department officials, the policy would seek to identify real-world challenges and emerging requirements in tourism, and create opportunities for start-ups, young entrepreneurs and innovators to build practical solutions around them.

Tourism Secretary V. Ram Prasath Manohar explained how the policy is meant to work in practice. "Selected products or solutions could be piloted at identified tourism destinations. Once we evaluate their effectiveness and success rate, we can scale up such products across the tourism ecosystem," he said. "This will give start-ups access to a real-world testing environment and potential market opportunities, while enabling the Tourism Department to adopt innovation and technology more rapidly."

The approach places the tourism department in the role of a facilitator as well as a user of new technology. Instead of commissioning solutions in the usual way through tenders and long procurement cycles, the department proposes to invite innovators to test their products at destinations where the problems are actually faced — a model that allows both sides to assess whether a solution works before it is adopted widely.

For start-ups, the stated benefit is access to real tourism sites and the possibility of a large public-sector buyer. For the department, the stated benefit is faster adoption of technology in services that range from visitor information and ticketing to mobility, accessibility and cleanliness at destinations.

Karnataka, and Bengaluru in particular, is home to one of the country's largest concentrations of technology and start-up activity, which the department intends to tap for the tourism sector. Tourism is a significant economic activity in the State, drawing visitors to destinations such as Hampi, Mysuru, the temple towns of the coastal belt and the hill regions, and supporting employment across hospitality, transport, food services, guides and handicrafts.

The department has not specified a date for framing or implementing the policy. Details such as the eligibility criteria for start-ups, the process for selecting products and solutions, the destinations chosen for pilots, and the yardsticks for evaluating their performance were also not disclosed.

Officials indicated that the finer contours of the policy would be worked out as it is drafted. For now, the announcement sets out the direction: to treat tourism as a field for experimentation and to invite the State's technology and entrepreneurial talent to solve problems that visitors, local communities and administrators encounter on the ground.

What remains to be seen is how the pilots are funded, how intellectual property and data collected at destinations are handled, and whether successful solutions are eventually procured and sustained by the department. Those details will determine whether the policy becomes a working channel for innovation or remains an announcement of intent.