rajeev chandrasekhar: Chips to Startup programme underway; electronics manufacturing to hit $300 billion by 2026: IT MoS

A Chips to Startup (C2S) programme has been initiated with an outlay of Rs 250 crore for a duration of five years, IT minister of state Rajeev Chandrasekhar said, in a written reply submitted to the Lok Sabha on Wednesday.

C2S programme aims to train 85,000 industry-ready manpower specialised in very-large-scale-integration VLSI/ chip design/ embedded system design.

ChipIN Centre has also been set up at the Centre for Development of Advanced Computing as a one-stop centre for providing access to chip design infrastructure and fabrication services to academia and startups across the country.

He also informed of memorandums of understanding with the USA, Japan, European Union, Purdue University, and IBM India to attract investment in the semiconductor manufacturing sector.

On hardware he said in FY 2022-23 the production was Rs 8,22,350 crores and demand for electronics was Rs 12,55,818 crores. The production of electronics manufacturing has been growing at a CAGR of 20.1% to Rs 8,22,350 crores in FY 2022-23 indicating high growth rate in electronic manufacturing.

Around 99.2% mobile handsets being used in India are made in India and we have become a mobile exporting country with $11.1 billion exports in FY 2022-23, he said. Electronics manufacturing is further expected to grow to Rs. 23,95,195 crore ($300 billion) by 2026.

As per industry estimates around 2.5 million direct and indirect jobs have been created in the electronics sector and is expected to reach 10 million jobs by 2025-26, he said.With an aim to boost local electronics manufacturing, increase scale, competitiveness, and domestic value addition in the country, MeitY notified National Policy on Electronics 2019 to position India as a global hub for electronics system design and manufacturing.

The Centre for Materials for Electronics Technology under MeitY has undertaken several projects in graphene including development of super capacitors, electrodes, and actuators. Meity has also collaborated with Tata Steel for setting up the India Innovation Centre on Graphene at Kochi, Chandrasekhar said.

Graphene possesses several properties such as high strength and electrical conductivity and finds application in several sectors including electronics.

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