In the presence of prime minister Narendra Modi and visiting German Chancellor Angela Merkel, Infineon Technologies India and National Skill Development Corporation (NSDC) signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) for skill development in the Indian semiconductor sector. The MoU involves the upskilling of workers, including the provision of material and expert trainers.

Infineon Technologies was represented by Arunjai Mittal, Member of the Board, while NSDC was represented by its managing director, Dilip Chenoy. Through this MoU, both parties will support the ‘Make in India’ programme to make India a manufacturing hub.

After the signing, Mr Mittal said: “The semiconductor market in India is projected to grow by more than 20 percent annually in the years to come. Infineon appreciates the advances made in this field as well as the recent progress that India as a business destination has made. We are excited about this collaboration with NSDC and look forward to the overall success of this project.”

An estimated US$ 50 billion (Rs 315,850 crore) worth of electronics and US$10 billion (Rs 63,170 crore) of semiconductors are imported into India each year due to the absence of a local manufacturing ecosystem. Studies indicate that by 2020, the amount of electronics imports may climb to US$ 400 billion (Rs 2,526,800 crore) and the amount of semiconductors may climb to US$ 50 billion respectively. Thus, the establishment of a local manufacturing ecosystem for semiconductors and electronics is seen as critical for India’s economic health.

At present, there is a vacuum in the skilled manpower in India in the fields of advanced technologies like semiconductors. The purpose of the agreement signed today is to improve academic and scholarly interactions. It will focus skilling of local youth for future employability and income generation. Specific modalities will be worked out for each of the above initiatives, giving details of scope, roles and responsibilities, monitoring mechanism for implementation. Semiconductor manufacturing is skill intensive and therefore the Indian government is keen to imbibe curriculum and set-up training facilities to develop skilled workforce for this area.

NSDC, a unique Public Private Partnership (PPP), with 51 percent equity held by private sector and the balance 49 percent by the Union Government, is a professionally run not-for-profit company that includes 33 Sector Skill Councils and over 203 training partners with over 3611 training centres spread across over 497 districts in the country. NSDC is mandated to skill 150 million Indians by 2022.