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By CK Nayak and Surbhi Misra
NEW DELHI (Reuters) - India's cabinet has approved a new semiconductor plant, a joint venture between HCL Technologies and Taiwan's Foxconn, costing 37.06 billion rupees ($435 million), information minister Ashwini Vaishnaw said on Wednesday.
The plant, which will be located near the Jewar airport in the northern state of Uttar Pradesh, is designed for a capacity of 20,000 wafers per month and can produce 36 million display driver chips, Vaishnaw said at a cabinet briefing in New Delhi.
The facility, which is the sixth plant approved under the India Semiconductor Mission, will begin commercial production in 2027, he added.
Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi has made chipmaking a top priority for India's economic strategy to boost its role in global electronics manufacturing, but the country currently has no operational chipmaking facility.
Earlier this month, Reuters reported that Indian billionaire Gautam Adani's group paused discussions with Israel's Tower Semiconductor for a $10-billion chip project after an internal review raised uncertainties around commercial demand.
The Maharashtra state government had initially announced approval for the Adani-Tower venture in September, which was expected to produce 80,000 wafers monthly and create 5,000 jobs.
In 2023, Foxconn's proposed $19.5-billion joint venture with Indian conglomerate Vedanta collapsed amid Indian government concerns over escalating project costs and delays in approving incentives.
Despite setbacks, other chip projects remain under development, including an $11-billion chip manufacturing and testing facility by the Tata Group and a $2.7 billion chip packaging plant by U.S.-based Micron.
($1 = 85.2500 Indian rupees)
(Reporting by CK Nayak, Surbhi Misra and Tanvi Mehta ; Editing by YP Rajesh and Emelia Sithole-Matarise)