India's growing electronics ecosystem creating opportunities for youth

MeitY Joint Secretary KK Singh highlighted India's growing semiconductor ecosystem and demographic advantage as opportunities for entrepreneurs. He noted the need to commercialize patents and expand the industry to Tier-2 and Tier-3 cities.

India has a growing semiconductor and electronics ecosystem that, along with its demographic advantage, expanding digital economy and large domestic market, is creating opportunities for young innovators and entrepreneurs, Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology (MeitY) Joint Secretary KK Singh said on Monday. “For young innovators and entrepreneurs, India today has extraordinary demographic advantage, a rapidly expanding digital economy, a large domestic market and a growing semiconductor and electronics ecosystem,” Singh said at the STPI Electropreneur Summit in New Delhi.

From Software to Hardware

Singh said India has established global leadership in software and IT services, but despite growing ecosystem it has distance to cover in electronics and semiconductors. He said the next phase of the country’s technology journey would draw on the strengths and learnings of the software industry. He said government intervention had played a role in the country’s technology journey.

Singh said technology leadership would ultimately depend on the ability to convert talent into intellectual property and products. He emphasised the need to convert intellectual property into products and products into globally competitive companies. He said patent filings had increased many-fold, but the number of patents being converted for commercialisation remained limited.

Expanding to Tier-2 and Tier-3 Cities

He said Electropreneur 2.0 should focus on novel ideas that can eventually lead to commercialisation. Singh said it was the government’s priority to expand the IT, IT-enabled services and electronics industry in Tier-2 and Tier-3 cities. He said the Electropreneur programme would also extend opportunities to innovators from Tier-2, Tier-3 and Tier-4 cities.

The Electropreneur 2.0 Programme

On Electropreneur 2.0, Singh said the project has an outlay of around Rs 47 crore, with around Rs 17 crore from NITI Aayog. The initiative is a joint effort involving STPI, IIIT-D and IESA, along with CSR support. He said the programme would provide seed funding, pre-incubation, acceleration and end-to-end support to startups in Electronic System Design and Manufacturing (ESDM), with particular opportunities for innovators from remote Tier-2 and Tier-3 cities.

According to the programme statement, Electropreneur 1.0 nurtured 59 startups, filed 66 patents and created a startup valuation of more than Rs 640 crore. For Electropreneur 2.0, the programme is targeting 500 startups, with the initiative expanding its reach to Tier-2 and Tier-3 cities.

Role of Mentorship and Government

Singh also emphasised the importance of mentorship, saying mentors should be matched with the specific requirements of startups and have accountability for the support they provide. He said the government’s role was to create a platform and enable innovators, while the ultimate responsibility for success rested with the startups themselves. (ANI)

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