Modi Pitches India As Global Semiconductor Hub Amid Supply Chain Race

🌏 Prime Minister Narendra Modi pitched India as a new global hub for semiconductor production on Thursday, urging technology firms to invest in what he called a "reliable" location. "Chips from Indian plants are reaching customers in India and across the world," Modi told executives from major global technology firms at a semiconductor conference in New Delhi. The pitch comes as countries globally seek to secure semiconductor supply chains and address vulnerabilities in global chip production exposed by geopolitical tensions.

📊 Modi met senior executives from Indian and global technology companies ahead of the conference. Representatives of Tata Electronics and CG Power, as well as Advantest, Applied Materials, ASML, Foxconn, Intel and Micron, were among those attending. The presence of ASML — the Dutch company that is the world's sole producer of extreme ultraviolet lithography machines essential for advanced chip manufacturing — signals that India's semiconductor push is being taken seriously by the global chipmaking supply chain ecosystem.

📜 Modi's Pitch: Reliable Location Amid Weaponised Supply Chains

"There are many challenges in front of the semiconductor industry. Amidst these challenges, the semiconductor industry also needs new and reliable locations," Modi said. "And India, I can assure you, is preparing itself for this." "When supply chains are being weaponised, its importance goes up further," Modi added. The reference to weaponised supply chains reflects the broader geopolitical context — the US-China tech decoupling, Taiwan Strait tensions and export controls on advanced chip technology have made supply chain diversification a strategic priority for global semiconductor firms.

• 💰 Semicon 2.0 incentive package: $13 billion+
• 🏛 Projects in commercial production: 5
• 👥 Engineers to be trained: 100,000 (semiconductor)
• 👥 AI training target: 10 million people
• 📅 India semiconductor push launch: 2021
• 🌏 Global attendees: Intel, ASML, Foxconn, Applied Materials, Micron, Advantest
• 🌏> Indian firms: Tata Electronics, CG Power

💰 Semicon 2.0: $13 Billion Incentive Programme

India launched its domestic chipmaking push in 2021 and has since backed a range of fabrication, design and packaging units. India in July approved a new semiconductor programme, offering more than $13 billion in financial assistance to expand domestic chip production and build a wider semiconductor ecosystem. The "Semicon 2.0" initiative builds on a programme launched in 2021 to reduce India's reliance on imported chips and attract investment into the sector. On Thursday, Modi remotely opened commercial production for two sites, taking the number of semiconductor projects in commercial production in India to five.

👥> Talent Pool: 100,000 Engineers And 10 Million AI-Trained

Modi reiterated plans to train 100,000 engineers for semiconductor projects and 10 million people in artificial intelligence. "Such a huge talent pool is a goldmine for all of you," he told industry officials, painting India as a secure place to set up operations. The talent pool pitch is strategically significant — semiconductor manufacturing requires highly skilled engineers in areas including process engineering, equipment maintenance, quality control and chip design. India's existing strength in IT services and engineering education provides a foundation for building semiconductor talent, though the specialised skills required for chip manufacturing will need targeted training programmes.

📜 Critics: India Decades Late

Critics say India is decades late starting, and remains far behind chip leaders in Taiwan, the Netherlands, Japan and China. But Modi countered: "For any country to reach here in such a short time isn't easy. This isn't a sector where you set up a factory, and work is done. It takes decades to achieve tech capabilities in this sector." He added: "In India, with your assistance, chip design, manufacturing, equipment manufacturing, material ecosystem, testing capability — we worked at all of it, at the same time, and have achieved success in it."

The critics' observation is factually correct — Taiwan's TSMC has decades of process refinement that India cannot replicate quickly. However, the strategic value of India's semiconductor push is not necessarily about competing with TSMC at the leading edge. India's opportunity lies in mature node manufacturing (28nm and above), packaging and testing — segments where the technology barrier is lower and where global demand is growing for automotive, industrial and IoT applications that do not require cutting-edge process nodes.

🌏 Implications For Bangladesh

For Bangladesh, India's semiconductor push carries indirect but strategically relevant implications. Bangladesh's ICT and IT-enabled services (IT-ITES) sector — currently generating $2-3 billion in annual exports — competes with India for offshore software development and BPO contracts. As India diverts engineering talent toward semiconductor manufacturing, some software development capacity may shift to alternative destinations including Bangladesh, potentially creating opportunities for Bangladesh's growing freelance and IT services community.

Additionally, if India successfully builds a domestic semiconductor ecosystem, the cost of semiconductor components for Bangladesh's light engineering and electronics manufacturing sectors could decrease — as Indian chips would be geographically closer and potentially cheaper than imports from Taiwan, South Korea or China. The coming years will reveal whether India's semiconductor ambition can translate from political vision to operational reality, and what spillover effects the initiative creates for neighbouring economies including Bangladesh.