Amid the renewed thrust on local manufacturing, India must take a lead in manufacturing of semiconductors and display panels to safeguard its economy and livelihoods against the global competition especially from China, Avneet Singh Marwah, CEO, Super Plastronics Pvt Limited (SPPL) has stressed SPPL is bullish on increasing its production capacity by 100%, producing 1 million TV units, and adding fresh consumer electronics products in 2022 and beyond.
“This pandemic has taught us way too many things, and one of the most important one being that India must take a lead in manufacturing of semiconductors and display panels if we are to safeguard our economy and livelihoods against any other upcoming crises and changes,” Marwah told IANS.
Marwah said that SPPL, a Kodak brand licensee, will soon move to a new plant that will increase its production capacity by 100%.
“This will actualize our production targets of 1 million units for the next year and beyond. Come 2022, we will also be adding fresh products with a focus on technology and simultaneously expand our research and development wing for the same,” Marwah emphasised.
Just five years ago, Indian industries were centered around trading goods and the maximum that companies came close to creating goods was by assembling raw materials to make products.
Raw materials were entirely almost sourced from China and other bigger manufacturing hubs.
According to him, the move by the Indian government to ban imports of CBUs (completely built up) such as ACs and TVs did set the right example which led the way for local manufacturing in India.
“The new manufacturing goals of the government will change the entire ecosystem for the better. We saw a grim scenario over the past two years since COVID-19 began, when not only did we face a shortage of raw materials but also a price increase for the same and for logistics too,” Marwah informed.
The industry has hailed the latest government’s decision to set up the India Semiconductor Mission (ISM) and approved Rs.77,000 crore ($10 billion) for the development of semiconductors and display manufacturing ecosystem in the country.
The Rs.76,000 crore scheme will be spread across 6 years. As part of the scheme, incentives worth Rs.2.3 lakh crore will be provided to position India as a global hub.
“This will also bring in money from global investors and we do envision for India’s manufacturing sector to contribute $3 trillion to the GDP by 2027,” said Marwah.
In 2022, said Marwah, we will also see Google TVs coming into action.
“A new TV unit, packed with fresh features, is set to completely change how our viewers interact with Smart TVs. The new and more sophisticated AI will reduce the time that we spend scouring for the perfect content to sit and watch,” he said.