India's semiconductor boom hinges on ecosystem growth |
India has seen many challenges since its Independence in driving industrialisation, not to mention the antiquated License Raj, which thwarted our growth while China zoomed past. We finally saw twilight in the late 90s in some conventional domains of industrialisation like automobiles, pharma, oil & gas. India received reasonable express of interest in semiconductors from leading companies to set up manufacturing in India based on invaluable engineering talent and ease of language. As destiny played out, our socialistic policies and equally bureaucratic approach did not create the necessary conducive environment. India missed out on the golden opportunity to harness its immense potential to make its mark early in the game. This also let to the famous' brain drain' that has been a challenging hole to plug, not to mention the resulting reputation damage to an entire industry in India that we are still working towards repairing.These past events have increased the gap between India and other countries as we cobbled together an ecosystem to encourage the semiconductor chip manufacturing industry in the country. Another force rose to capture our imagination and talent during this time. The IT Industry saw exponential growth. However, this unprecedented boom in information technology masked a critical vulnerability: our growing dependence on our prowess in the IT services sector, so much so that it compromised resilience across strategic sectors. We simply stopped looking beyond IT services.While the IT sector's meteoric rise commanded attention, it inadvertently diverted focus from establishing sovereign capabilities in semiconductor manufacturing--a shortcoming whose implications now reverberate across defense systems, critical infrastructure, and emerging technologies.Historical lessons serve as critical guideposts for strategic realignment. India's recent policy initiatives, handsome capital subsidies complimented by state-level incentives, have captured domestic corporations'........