ICA, UP sign MoU for Rs 1,000 cr investment in ESDM

Lucknow: Indian Cellular Association (ICA) and the Government of Uttar Pradesh have signed an MoU, which will entail an investment of up to Rs 1,000 crore in Electronics Manufacturing Clusters (EMCs) in the state.

The MoU was signed by Pankaj Mohindroo, National President, Indian Cellular Association (ICA) and Jiwesh Nandan, Principal Secretary, IT & Electronics on behalf of the Government of Uttar Pradesh.

“ICA will encourage its members and facilitate to establish their projects in the proposed Electronics Manufacturing Clusters (EMCs) in Uttar Pradesh which are to be established in approximate 100 acre land or more which can generate investments of approximately Rs 1000 crore in these EMCs,” said Mohindoo.

“For establishment of EMCs, Government of Uttar Pradesh would facilitate ICA to obtain necessary permissions/registrations/approvals/clearances etc. as per the existing policies/rules and regulations of the government and would also help its members to avail incentives under various schemes announced by State/Central Governments, wherever applicable,” Nandan said.

As part of the MoU, Government of Uttar Pradesh will also facilitate ICA members to establish the aforesaid Projects in the State in a time bound manner.

Mr Mohindroo who is also the chairman of “Fast Track Task Force” set up by the Department of Electronics and Information Technology (DeitY), Government of India, “to re-establish and catalyze growth in mobile handset and component manufacturing eco-system in India”, also unveiled “Vision 2020” to make Uttar Pradesh a global hub for Electronics System Design and Hardware Manufacturing (ESDM).

As per the Vision 2020 unveiled by ICA, it is envisaged that investments to the tune of USD 12 billion (approximately Rs 72,000 crore) could be realized in the state of UP in the ESDM (Electronics System Design and Manufacturing) sector by 2020 with the goal of scaling up total value of electronics hardware manufacturing to USD 20 billion (approximately rupees Rs 1,20,000 crore).

Vision 2020 of ICA also visualizes creation of additional 3.6 million job opportunity in this sector while pushing the electronics hardware export from state to USD 5 billion by 2020 from the current level.

“ICA’s vision and endeavor is to support and facilitate the ‘Make in India’ vision of the Government of India. We will provide our expertise for creation of a robust ESDM eco-system, policy reforms and relevant skill development in the state which can help transform the state into a global manufacturing hub for ESDM sector,” said Mr Mohindroo.

It may be noted that the demand for electronics products in the Indian market was USD 45 billion in 2008-09 and is expected to reach USD 400 Billion by 2020. Domestic demand is expected to be driven by growth in income levels leading to higher off-take of electronics products, automation demands of corporate sector and the government’s focus on e-governance.

The domestic production in 2008-09 was about USD 20 Billion. At the current rate of growth, the domestic production can cater to a demand of USD 100 billion in 2020 as against a demand of USD 400 Billion and the rest would have to be met by imports. This aggregates to a demand supply gap of nearly USD 300 Billion by 2020. Unless the situation is corrected, it is likely that by 2020, the electronics import may far exceed oil imports.

“Our vision is to transform India into a global hub for electronics system design and manufacturing (ESDM) so as to meet the growing domestic and global demand and reduce country’s import dependency. There are many challenges to advance the same – infrastructure gap, tax structure, supply chain and logistics, inflexible labour laws, limited R&D focus, inadequate funding and limited value addition. The industry looks forward to closely working with the Central and State Government to close these gaps and help realize our vision to transform UP as a global hub in the ESDM sector,” added Mohindroo.