The Honorable Minister of State PMO, Shri Prithviraj Chavan released The ISA-Ernst & Young Benchmarking Study: “India in the global Semiconductor Design Ecosystem” at the Vision Summit 2007 at Hyderabad. The Benchmarking study highlights the challenges of the Indian Semiconductor Design industry and suggests the key imperatives to facilitate a sustainable growth of the industry and make India the preferred destination for semiconductor design activity.

The report also addresses the factors influencing business decisions for locating semiconductor design facilities across the globe. It has compared India with other semiconductor design destinations like Canada, China, Czech Republic, Israel, Taiwan, the UK and the USA. India is well placed among its peers. The study also covers some of the significant challenges that confront companies seeking to expand semiconductor design activities in India- availability & scalability of talent; cost & quality of talent, quality of technical education and robustness of IPR regime were the top factors influencing the location of design centers.

Speaking at the release of the report, Shri Prithviraj Chavan said, “The study helps gauge the industry’s strengths, challenges faced by the industry and highlights key imperatives for continued growth in the Semiconductor Design industry. I would like to compliment both Ernst & Young and Indian Semiconductor Association for bringing out this benchmarking study.”

He further added, “The manufacturing sector in India is opening up and the semiconductor industry is a very important driver of the nation’s economy. The UPA government will shortly announce the Semicon policy prior to the budget along with an incentive package for all semiconductor based manufacturing’s, display technology, LCD, plasma, solar & photo voltaic cells, testing, advanced micro & nano devices etc. Direct subsidy will define the threshold of capital investments made by the companies and the calculations will be based on the Net Present Value (NPV) and this would be over and above the benefits from SEZ’s.”

Mr. Sunil Bhumralkar, Director, Ernst & Young India Pvt. Ltd said, “India’s semiconductor design sector has witnessed a rapid growth in the recent years mainly owing to the availability of talent and its cost advantage, which are India’s core strengths. However, it is crucial to improve the quality of talent and maintain cost competitiveness, in order to sustain the fast paced growth of the sector.”

Poornima Shenoy, President ISA added “For the first time we have information for corporates to peg their business decisions. The ISA-EYI study has taken industry inputs and used parameters that are of relevance in making these decisions.”

She further added, “The semiconductor design industry is well poised to play a leading role the global design ecosystem. India has the necessary strengths to take on the mantle, with the concerted efforts by stakeholders - the industry, academia and government.

Smt. Ratna Prabha, IT Secretary AP said, “The growth of IT and ITES in AP has been steady and phenomenal and we have achieved about 51% growth this fiscal and expect to earn Rs 18- 19 crores. ”

The Industry Association roundtable brought together the country’s hardware industry bodies with leaders who chartered out the course that India needed to compete in the global electronics eco-system. The speakers included Ajai Chowdhry from MAIT, Ram N Agarwal from WeP India, Dr Sandeep Muju of Moser Baer, Vinod Sharma from ELCINA and Rajendra Kumar Khare from ISA.