Union Minister Rajeev Chandrasekhar Unveils Two Semiconductor Fabless Companies

An announcement on two futureDESIGN semiconductor fabless companies under the Semicon India Design Linked Incentive (DLI) scheme was made by Minister of State for Electronics & IT, Skill Development and Entrepreneurship, and Jal Shakti, Shri Rajeev Chandrasekhar during the launch of "Digital India FutureLABS” at IIIT Delhi. The Digital India FutureLABS Summit 2024 also witnessed announcement of 20 MoUs with Industry for implementation of the futureLABS in 6 verticals - Automotive, Compute, Communication, Strategic Electronics, Industrial Electronics/ IoT and Design & innovation.

These two Karnataka based futureDESIGN semiconductor fabless companies announced for financial support under the DLI Scheme has been providing range of chipsets and solutions for communication and med-tech sectors.

Parag Naik, founder, Saankhya Labs, mentioned that – “Saankhya Labs is a wireless communication and semiconductor solutions company, designing a full spectrum of next-gen communication solutions for the present and the future. This includes products and solutions for broadband, satellite and broadcast applications including 5G NR, Direct to Mobile (D2M) Broadcast, rural broadband connectivity, satellite communication modems for IoT applications and multi-standard DTV modulators and demodulators.”

Vijay Muktamath, founder, Sensesemi Technologies mentioned that - “As part of the DLI Scheme, Sensesemi will be developing the SoC for IoMT and IoT devices, that shall have MCU and wireless IP integrated with ultra-low power analog front end with AI inferencing IP. Sensesemi aims to drive India’s semiconductor capabilities by providing connected SoC for everything from smart wearables, med-tech sector and other connected devices.”

Earlier the ChipIN Centre setup at C-DAC under the SemiconIndia DLI Scheme announced the following support for state-of-the-art chip design tools from global companies-

1. Support to academic institutions:
   1. EDA tools for academia from Synopsys to ‘pan-India academic institutions’, Cadence Design Systems to ‘150 institutions and Siemens-EDA & Ansys to ‘120 institutions’. At present, thousands of researchers & faculty members at 100+ academic institutions across the country are using these tools from ChipIN Centre to design their semiconductor chips.
   2. FPGA Hardware Boards from Xilinx to 100 academic institutions.
   3. Tapeout support to academia & start-ups for fabricating their designs at SCL foundry & overseas foundries.
2. Support to start-ups: EDA tools for pan-India startups from Synopsys, Cadence Design Systems and Siemens-EDA to design their semiconductor chips.

In addition to these global companies, ChipIN is exploring to engage with other leading design & solution companies like- Keysight technologies & Silvaco for CAD/ EDA solutions and Qualcomm & NXP Semicondcutors for startup mentorship & support and enabling a global platform to start-ups. Engaged with over 125 academic instituions and 15 start-ups at present, ChipIN intends to become the one-stop center for chip designers across the country.

The Digital India futureLABS, coordinated by C-DAC, aims to tap into the trillion-dollar opportunity presented by the Electronics System Design and Manufacturing (ESDM) sector. The initiative seeks to move up the value chain, fortify domestic R&D, and create a collaborative ecosystem for the development of IPs, standards, and the next-generation Electronics System Design in the country.

Digital India futureLABS initiative announced by Minister Shri Rajeev Chandrasekhar combined with SemiconIndia futureDESIGN and futureSKILLS will define the #IndiaTechade and make India #ElectronicsProductNation and SemiconductorProductNation".