Like-minded nations collaborating with India to make it a chip manufacturing hub: IT Secy

New Delhi: Due to the prevailing geopolitical situation, like-minded countries are collaborating with India to make it a major semiconductor manufacturing destination, a top Electronics and IT ministry official said on Sunday. In an interview, Ministry of Electronics and IT Secretary S Krishnan said pilot facilities of US storage semiconductor maker Micron and Tata Electronics have already rolled out chips, and their main plants in Gujarat will begin to produce made-in-India chips from the later part of 2025. "Globally, and thanks to geopolitical circumstances, there is an increasing realisation that semiconductors are a very important and strategic commodity, and therefore, we need substantial resilience in the production of semiconductors," Krishnan said.

The importance of resilience in semiconductors was underlined during the pandemic when many industries -- including the auto industries, medical devices industries and other electronics, and consumer electronics industries -- suffered because they did not have access to chips, which led to a belief that there should be greater diversification, especially for sourcing of semiconductors, he added. "In order to build this resilience, many like-minded countries are collaborating with India to develop India as the next major destination, where semiconductor manufacturing can actually take place. This is fundamentally to build resilience in the global semiconductor value chain. We have an agreement with the United States, European Union, UK, Japan, and now, with Singapore as well," Krishnan noted.

The government has approved projects entailing investments of Rs 1.5 lakh crore to date. This excludes the recently announced Adani Group- Tower Semiconductor's Rs 83,000 crore investment in setting up a new chip plant in Maharashtra. "The government has cleared five projects under the India Semiconductor Mission. The construction of the main plant by Micron in Gujarat is at an advanced stage. They have completed their pilot facility. Likewise, Tata Electronics has also set up its pilot facility for ATMP in Karnataka. These two pilot facilities have already rolled out the first chips. From the main facilities, sometime towards the later half of 2025, we should see the rollout of the first chips," Krishnan said.

He also pointed out that semiconductor ecosystem companies are showing huge interest in India, and there has been a four-times increase in participation in the upcoming Semicon India event due to the potential that the country holds for the semiconductor ecosystem. "Semi is a global association of all the semiconductor industries. They hold these global conferences in the United States, Japan, Taiwan, Kuala Lumpur and these kinds of other locations. "India is joining the select group of countries in hosting a Semicom. I'm very happy to inform you that this event in India has four times as many registrations and number of incidents as they saw when the first conference was held in any other country," Krishan said.

According to Semi, there will be more than 650 booths and over 250 semiconductor companies at Semicon India. Krishnan said the idea that India has the potential to be the major semiconductor chip manufacturer in the world and can meet the needs of global resilience is something that excites a large number of companies and other countries as well. "They (companies) look at the potential of India both as a source of human resources, a destination to manufacture with the appropriate technical talent, and at the same time, a potentially large market where they can actually sell semiconductor products," Krishnan said.