Semi Conductor policy to be placed before the Cabinet today
By siliconindia   |   Thursday, 11 January 2007, 18:30 IST
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New Delhi: The much-awaited semiconductor policy or incentives for establishing a semiconductor fabrication in India will be placed before the cabinet today as promised by Communications and IT Minister Dayanidhi Maran. This package comes in after the Finance Minster promised support to the semiconductor industry in his budget speech last year. He mentioned that the time was ripe for making India a preferred destination for semiconductor manufacturing long with other high technology IT products like flat LCD/OLED/Plasma Panel Displays; and storage devices. In a draft cabinet note, the special incentive package for investments in the manufacture of semiconductors fabrication along with other micro and nano-technology. The Government has gauged the minimum investments to avail the scheme at Rs 2,500 crore for the project. The IT department has also proposed providing a fiscal incentive of 25 percent of the capital expenditure incurred during the first 10 years of a project. Frost and Sullivan conducted a study and according to them, India is the fastest growing market for electronic products in the world with consumption expected to grow to $363 billion by 2015 from $28 billion in 2005. India will account for 11 per cent of the global electronics market by 2015, compared to 1.8 per cent in 2005. India will also consume $36billion of semiconductors in 2015, amounting to 6 per cent of the global market. Earlier, National Manufacturing Competitiveness Council (NMCC) chairman V Krishnamurthy noted that while India had demonstrated its prowess in software and services, the hardware side had not kept pace with the progress in software. He also added that growth in the ICT sector cannot be matched with a poor manufacturing base.

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