Premium| Listen to this article |
The Centre has invited applications from domestic companies, start-ups and MSMEs under its Design Linked Incentive (DLI) Scheme to create a vibrant ecosystem for semiconductor chip design in the country.
Under the DLI scheme, financial incentives and design infrastructure support will be extended to domestic companies, startups and MSMEs across various stages of development and deployment of semiconductor design for Integrated Circuits (ICs), chipsets, system on chips (SoCs), systems & IP cores and semiconductor linked design for over a period of 5 years.
The scheme, which was a part of ₹76,000 crore ($10 billion) package that the government announced in December, aims to nurture at least 20 domestic companies involved in semiconductor design and facilitating them to achieve turnover of more than ₹1500 Crore in the next 5 years, the Ministry of Electronics & IT said in a statement.
According to the statement, C-DAC (Centre for Development of Advanced Computing), a scientific society operating under MeitY, will serve as the nodal agency for implementation of the DLI scheme.
The scheme has three components – chip design infrastructure support, product design-linked incentive and deployment linked incentive.
Under the chip design infrastructure support, the C-DAC will setup the India Chip Centre to host the state-of-the-art design infrastructure and facilitate its access to supported companies.
Under the design-linked incentive component, a reimbursement of up to 50% of the eligible expenditure subject to a ceiling of ₹15 crore per application will be provided as fiscal support to the approved applicants who are engaged in semiconductor design.
Under the deployment component, an incentive of 6% to 4% of net sales turnover over 5 years subject to a ceiling of ₹30 Crore per application will be provided to approved applicants whose semiconductor design for Integrated Circuits (ICs), Chipsets, System on Chips (SoCs), Systems & IP Cores and semiconductor linked design are deployed in electronic products.
The approved applicants that claim incentives under the scheme will be encouraged to retain their domestic status (i.e., more than 50% of the capital in it is beneficially owned by resident Indian citizens and/ or Indian companies, which are ultimately owned and controlled by resident Indian citizens) for a period of three years after claiming incentives under the scheme.
A dedicated portal has been made available – www.chips-dli.gov.in - for inviting Online applications from January 1, 2022 to December 31, 2024. The applicants can find the guidelines of the DLI Scheme on the portal and register themselves for availing support under the scheme.
Never miss a story! Stay connected and informed with Mint. Download our App Now!!