Semiconductors: PM Modi promises “red carpet”; Vedanta tying up with partners
Virendra Pandit
New Delhi: Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Friday said India aims to emerge as a hub of the chipmaking industry and promised to “roll out a red carpet” for global semiconductor manufacturers.
Inaugurating the second global summit of SemiconIndia in Gandhinagar, he said semiconductor firms are committing investments in India which wants to take the ‘first-mover advantage’ in attracting global chip manufacturers.
The three-day summit, organized by the Government of India, is being attended by global semiconductor majors like Foxconn, Advanced Micro Devices (AMD), Micron, and Applied Materials.
“Earlier, people were questioning our aim to make chips and asking ‘why to invest (in India)’. Now, they ask ‘Why not invest,” he said. “Whoever moves fast in this will get the first-mover’s advantage… we are rolling out the red carpet for them.”
The PM said India has rapidly grown in electronic manufacturing. “A few years ago, India started emerging as a major player in the electronics sector. Today our share has increased multiple times… In 2014, electronics production in India was less than USD 30 billion, and today it is over USD 100 billion.”
At the event, the USA-based AMD announced to invest nearly USD 400 million in India over the next five years and build its largest design center in Bengaluru. The 500,000-square-foot campus will be AMD’s 10th office location in India. The company, with more than 6,500 employees now, will hire another 3,000 people in the next five years.
India’s global oil-to-metals conglomerate Vedanta’s Chairman Anil Agarwal said his company has identified a world-class technology partner and is tying up with it.
“For semiconductors, we have identified a world-class partner for technology and are in the process of tying up with them,” he said at SemiconIndia 2023.
“Vedanta is fully committed to building semiconductor and display fab. The kind of response we have gotten in Japan, Korea, and America is great. The new ecosystem will be built around Gujarat and we have signed MoUs for this purpose,” he said.
Gujarat will emerge as a semiconductor hub, Agarwal said, adding it “is the right place for creating the Silicon Valley of India.”
Vedanta remains committed to building India’s first semiconductor and display fabs in Dholera Special Investment Region in Gujarat, and substantial progress has taken place to tie up technology and equity partners in semiconductors, an official said.
Akarsh K Hebbar, Global MD of Vedanta Semiconductors and Display, recently said the company is awaiting the government nod to its applications under the modified scheme for semiconductor and display fabs.
As soon as it gets the green signal, it will set out on the path to make India self-reliant in electronics in line with the PM’s vision, he said in a statement.
India’s semiconductor market will touch USD 64 billion by 2026, almost three times its 2019 size of USD 22.7 billion, a report said recently. The country’s telecom stack and industrial applications will account for two-thirds of the total market share.
According to a report by Counterpoint Research and the India Electronics & Semiconductor Association (IESA), the manufacturing of semiconductor chips in the country will be driven by domestic and export markets with significant demand from the consumer electronics, telecom, IT hardware, and industrial sectors.
