Soon, a VC fund for electronics firms

Hardware and semiconductor companies in the country have something to cheer, as the government is considering setting up Angel/Venture funds for electronics-specific firms.

Speaking at the IESA Vision Summit here, Government of India Joint Secretary (Department of Electronics and Information Technology) Ajay Kumar said, “It is expected that elctronics-specific venture capital funds should be available in the next few months.”

This comes at a time when Indian hardware startups are facing difficulties to raise fundings as venture capitalists and angel investors prefer to open their purse strings to help software companies.

This apart, a dedicated Working Group has been set up in Department of Electronics and Information Technology (DeitY) to consider specific R&D and product development proposals which will help the manufacturing and IP development for electronics in the country.

“A detailed project report for setting up a Rs 10,000 crore EDF is being examined by the government,” Kumar added.

Kumar also spoke of CAREL – a high-level committee, which has made recommendations regarding development of six major electronic products. These include set top boxes, tablets, smartphones, smart cards, smart energy metres and micro ATMs.

“Efforts to develop these products in collaboration with industry have been initiated and an expression of interest (EoI) has been floated inviting industry to develop conditional access system (CAS) with grant from the government,” Kumar explained.
The government has also initiated a special effort to scale up PhDs in electronic system design and manufacturing.The scheme provides support to 3,000 PhD students during the 12th Plan.

He added that setting up of semiconductor wafer fab is another major step and the empowered committee set up to identify technology and investors and to recommend quantum of incentives is in the final stages of its recommendations and the decision can be expected in March 2013.