With the first semiconductor fabrication (fab) plant in India set to be announced soon, the Union Minister for Electronics and IT Ashwini Vaishnaw said he sees a vibrant semiconductor industry in India in the next three to four years.

Vaishnaw, who was speaking at the Confederation of Indian Industry (CII) Partnership Summit 2023 on Tuesday, said at present, electronics manufacturing is nearly a $87-billion industry in country. India stands second in terms of phone manufacturing and third in terms of exports.

On the supply side, the minister said the country is taking the following initiatives:

Building an ecosystem

Have a very clearly laid out policy framework

Creating a semiconductor industry

Elaborating on the third point, Vaishnaw said it is a new industry in India, which cannot just come about overnight. "It requires consistent effort, tremendous focus and huge engagement with the stakeholders," he said.

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Talking about what India has done so far in terms of creating a semiconductor industry, the minister said it has touched base with every stakeholder in the industry, be it the gas manufacturers, chemical manufacturers or the photo lithography equipment suppliers. "Our approach has been — we know it is a new industry, yes, we know it is an uphill task, but we are committed to do what is required to succeed," he said.

The minister added that India has established "a very high say-do ratio", where every stakeholder has given feedback that the country is sticking to its word and doing what it is saying it would. This he said is creating credibility and leading the country to an almost inflection point, "where the first fab should be declared in the coming few weeks," he said, adding that this is just the beginning.

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Vaishnaw said that with the kind of interest many other stakeholders and other semiconductor participants are showing in India, the country is of the view that with the work it is doing — both at the industry and government-level (states as well as centres) — "we should see a vibrant semiconductor industry in the next three to four years".

On another note, talking about the latest developments regarding the Silicon Valley Bank (SVB) collapse, Vaishnaw earlier in the day had said that the SVB resolution is reassuring and would bring much relief to startups. The US administration has announced that the SVB depositors would have access to their money as federal regulators stepped in to back all the deposits.

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