Tata Group’s Assam Semiconductor Plant To Be Operational By Mid-2025

Tata Sons chairperson N Chandrasekaran on Saturday (August 3) said that the conglomerate’s semiconductor plant in Assam will be operationalised by mid-2025. 

Chandrasekaran made the comments during the “Bhoomi Pujan” (ground-breaking) ceremony of Tata Electronics’ semiconductor assembly and test facility in Assam’s Jagiroad.

“Considering that we want to move fast, we are trying to accelerate the building of this factory and we hope sometime in 2025 we will be able to complete part of the facilities and quickly start our operations,” Chandrasekaran added.

In a statement, the company also said that the INR 27,000 Cr unit will assemble and test semiconductor chips for applications across automotive, mobile devices, artificial intelligence (AI) and other key segments.

The company also said that the project will generate more than 27,000 direct and indirect jobs in the region. Tata Electronics added that the plant in Assam is “strategically located with access to abundant water and green power and proximity to current semiconductor packaging and test hubs in countries like Taiwan, Malaysia, Vietnam, and Singapore”.

“… The innovation-driven industry will propel Assam in the global electronics global supply chain ecosystem. Tata Group has strong ties with Assam and 60,000 employees of the group are working here in various industries,” added Chandrasekaran.

Addressing the event virtually, union IT minister Ashwini Vaishnaw said that the semiconductor industry will pave the way for employment opportunities in various upstream and downstream industries.

Vaishnaw added that the unit will be the “site for development of indigenous advanced semiconductor packaging technologies including wire bond, flip chip and I-SIP (integrated system in package) technologies” which will be developed indigenously. 

The union minister also underlined that 85,000 individuals are being trained in semiconductor chip design at 113 academic institutions across the country. 

As per Tata Electronics, the semiconductor plant has been envisaged with a proposed capacity of producing 4.83 Cr semiconductor chips per day. 

The development comes a day after the Centre reportedly kicked off the disbursement process for US-based chipmaker Micron under the production-linked incentive (PLI) scheme. The report added that disbursals under the initiative for other applicants, including Tata, are expected to commence soon. 

The development comes as the government has ramped up its focus on spurring semiconductor manufacturing in the country. Powering this push is the PLI scheme, which has an outlay of INR 76,000 Cr, to support the semiconductor and display manufacturing ecosystem in the country. 

India has also signed pacts with various global semiconductor manufacturing giants to set up manufacturing units domestically including the likes of CG Power, Renesas, Advanced Micro Devices (AMD), Micron, and Qualcomm.

Additionally, the government set aside INR 1K Cr to back semiconductor design startups last year.