The Centre has provisionally approved investment proposals worth ₹3,516 crore from 24 companies in the third round of the PLI scheme for components of ACs and LED lights.

“The government has provisionally selected 18 new companies committing investments of ₹2,299 crore. In addition, six existing PLI beneficiaries have been provisionally selected to upgrade to higher investment categories, committing an additional investment of ₹1,217 crore,” the statement added.

The 18 new beneficiaries include 10 manufacturers of components for air conditioners and 8 manufacturers of LED lights.

AC component makers include Jupiter Aluminium Industries, Voltas Components, Ram Ratna Wires, SMEL Steel Structural, and Next Generation Manufacturers. Existing AC component beneficiaries of the scheme, such as LG Electronics, Blue Star, Hindalco, and Voltas, have also ramped up investments under the scheme.

LED lights component makers who have received approval for their proposals include Ikio Solutions, Lumax Industries, Uno Minda, Neolite ZKWX, Dhruv Industries, among others.

The official statement said that 38 applications were received by the government for the PLI scheme. “13 applicants, including two existing applicants, are being referred to the Committee of Experts (CoE) for examination and its recommendations,” it added. This includes the applications of Atomberg, KRN HVAC, Viera Electrotech, and Star Eltech.

With the third round, a total of 84 companies under the PLI scheme for white goods are set to bring investments of ₹10,478 crore, resulting in production worth ₹1,72,663 crore.

For air conditioners, companies will be manufacturing components like compressors, copper tubes (plain and/or grooved), control assemblies for IDU or ODU, heat exchangers, and BLDC motors, among others. Similarly, for LED lights, LED chip packaging, LED drivers, LED engines, LED light management systems, and metallized films for capacitors, etc., will be manufactured in India.

The Union Cabinet had approved the Production-Linked Incentive (PLI) scheme for white goods (air conditioners and LED lights) to be implemented from FY 2021-22 to FY 2028-29, with an outlay of ₹6,238 crore on April 7, 2021. The scheme was notified by DPIIT on April 16, 2021.

“The scheme extends an incentive of 6 per cent to 4 per cent on a reducing basis on incremental sales for a period of five years subsequent to the base year, along with one year of gestation period. Domestic value addition is expected to grow from the current 15-20 per cent to 75-80 per cent,” it added.