Hervanta

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Hervanta is a large suburb, or satellite city, of Tampere in Finland, located next to Hallila some 10 km south of the city centre.

Home to a population of over 26,000, Hervanta is best known for its prefabricated blocks of flats. The total number of apartments is about 11,000. Nearly a fifth of the inhabitants (some 4,500 people) are students, many of them enrolled at the Tampere University of Technology (TUT) or the Police School. The largest student housing complex is Mikontalo, in fact nearly 3% of people in Hervanta reside there. Almost 8% of Hervanta's population is composed of foreigners from 75 different nationalities.

Hervanta currently covers an area of 13.8 km² and is continuing to grow. It was selected as Finland's top suburb in a survey conducted by the Helsingin Sanomat newspaper and published on 17 August 2003.

The complex of commercial buildings in the town center of Hervanta was designed by the Finnish architect Reima Pietilä.

[edit] Technology

Hervanta is sometimes called the Silicon Valley of Finland, because of the high concentration of high tech companies in the area and the presence of the Tampere University of Technology. As well as the University, Hervanta is also home to the Hermia science centre and the VTT office complex. The world's first-ever GSM phone call was made in Hervanta in 1991, when Radiolinja started building its GSM network. Nokia and many other companies have offices in Hervanta.