The Indian government is hoping companies that are part of its new $1 billion incentive plan will produce up to 1.61 trillion rupees ($21.59 billion) of IT hardware in the country by 2025.
The $1 billion incentive plan, which aims to boost exports of laptops, tablets, servers, and personal computers, will be supported by Dell, Wistron’s ICT, Flextronics, and Foxconn, as well as ten domestic companies including smartphone and laptop manufacturer Lava and LED TV panel manufacturer Dixon.
Through the plan, manufacturers will receive an incentive of 1% to 4% cashback over four years on additional sales of goods manufactured inside the country. The scheme is expected to generate 36,000 new jobs as a result.
Shri Ravi Shankar Prasad, union minister for Electronics & IT, Communications, Law and Justice, said that the scheme has been a huge success in terms of the applications received from global as well as domestic manufacturing companies.
“We are optimistic and looking forward to building a strong ecosystem across the value chain and integrating with the global value chains, thereby strengthening [the] electronics manufacturing ecosystem in the country,” he added.
This initiative is aiming to turn India into a competitive destination for electronics manufacturing and give a boost to prime minister Modi’s call for 'AtmaNirbhar Bharat', a Hindi phrase for a self-reliant India.
In May, India was reportedly delaying approvals for Wi-Fi modules from China as it aimed to encourage more products to be manufactured domestically. This caused companies like Dell and HP to delay product launches in the region as a government department had withheld approval for the modules since November.
Indian telco Reliance Jio and Google Cloud partnered last week to provide 5G technology for enterprise customers and consumers across the country. Reliance Jio is also set to launch a new smartphone with Google in September, the JioPhone Next, which will be based on an optimised OS that is leveraged from the Andriod and Play Store.
