Provisions under Semicon 2.0 to advance investment in chip-designing: MeitY Secretary
Ministry of Electronics and IT Secretary S Krishnan has said that provisions under Semicon 2.0 to provide incentives to Indian chip-making firms against equity are expected to drive largescale investment required for the development of advanced chips for technology such as artificial intelligence. Highlighting the need of investments for advance chip, he pointed that the government can provide only about Rs 15 crore under design-linked incentive scheme, while designing high-end chips may require Rs 1,000 crore or more. Therefore, chip-making firms can get investment from a venture capitalist or somebody who believes that the firm will be able to bring out chip.
On July 15, the government approved Rs 1.27 trillion (around $14 billion) Semicon 2.0 programme to accelerate semiconductor design and manufacturing capabilities. The initiative will be in effect for six years starting FY27. Krishnan noted that ‘The idea of co-investment is two-fold. One, that we increase the overall funding, which is available. Two, the government doesn't do the selection because it doesn't have that capacity. When whitelisted venture capitalist funds invest, we will co-invest,’.
Further, Krishnan said that the manufacturing of advance chips might take time but the design of these will happen in the coming years. Currently, advance chips are considered semiconductor that contain 7 nano meter and smaller nodes. India's first chip manufacturing unit will start with production old technology node of 28 nano meter, which is generally used for power electronics. The government approved Semicon 2.0 with an aim to develop IPs, designs of chips and systems. The work under Semicon 2.0 is expected to place India as a key semiconductor chip-design IP country.
