It's time for India to "learn to run" in the semicon journey: Vaishnaw Ashwini
Union Minister for Electronics and Information Technology Ashwini
Vaishnaw on Sunday said India must now “learn to run” in its semiconductor
journey, signalling a shift from foundational capacity building to accelerated
growth under the next phase of the India Semiconductor Mission.
Speaking at the Gujarat SemiConnect conference in
Gandhinagar, Vaishnaw said India had successfully laid the groundwork for a new
semiconductor industry and was ready to scale up.
“We have started a totally new industry in our country. It
was a steep learning curve but we were very pragmatic. We decided to learn to
walk before you run. That first principle of learning to walk is now done. Now
the time has come to learn to run and run at a good pace so that we can have
this journey for many, many years in our country,” he said.
ISM 2.0 roadmap
Vaishnaw outlined the roadmap for ISM 2.0 (India
Semiconductor Mission), describing it as the “reverse” of ISM 1.0. While the
first phase focused on attracting fabrication and assembly units, the next
phase will prioritise strengthening the design ecosystem, building the
materials supply chain and expanding the talent base.
He said the top priority under ISM 2.0 would be to empower
India’s design ecosystem and enable deeptech startups to create globally
competitive semiconductor companies comparable to Qualcomm, Broadcom and
Nvidia.
“The second priority will be getting the equipment
manufacturing and equipment design ecosystem in our country,” he said, adding
that India must not only manufacture chips but also produce the machines and
materials used in chipmaking, along with strengthening testing and validation
infrastructure.
Focus on talent
Talent development will continue to remain a central pillar,
Vaishnaw said, highlighting an anticipated global shortfall of two million
semiconductor professionals.
“That gap has to be filled by India. It means opportunities
for our youth. That is where our youth will get the next huge wave of
employment and we are prepared for that,” he said.
Industry perspective
In his keynote address, Randhir Thakur, chief
executive officer and managing director of Tata Electronics, said N.
Chandrasekaran, chairman of Tata Sons, is keen to develop the Dholera
semiconductor ecosystem and generate large-scale employment.
Thakur said Tata Electronics currently has over 7,000 people
working at its Dholera site, a number expected to rise to 20,000 at peak
operations. He stressed the importance of timely development of social
infrastructure to support growth.
“We have already onboarded expats from 16 countries and 300
of our employees are trained in Taiwan,” he said.
Meanwhile, Sanjay Mehrotra, chief executive officer
of Micron Technology, emphasised the need for supply chain proximity in the
semiconductor industry.
“In semiconductors, the supply chain must move at the speed
of light,” Mehrotra said, underscoring the importance of closely integrated
supplier ecosystems as India scales up its semiconductor ambitions.
