As the government doubles down on IT hardware manufacturing in the country, the India Cellular & Electronics Association (ICEA) on Wednesday announced a high-level committee to boost manufacturing and exports of the IT hardware (laptop/tablet) sector.

The panel, chaired by HP India Managing Director Ketan Patel, will create a roadmap to ensure significant investments for the creation of a globally competitive IT hardware component, parts, and design ecosystem in India by 2026.

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According to Patel, the PC and tablet market is approximately $230 billion globally and it is essential to create economies of scale to build a sustainable manufacturing base in India.

“I wish to prepare a concrete IT manufacturing roadmap for the next five years with desired outcomes regarding employment, contribution to GDP, and possible value additions,” he said, adding that their interactions with the government have been highly encouraging in this direction.

Earlier this month, the Electronics and IT Ministry selected 14 applicants under the Production-Linked Incentive (PLI) scheme for IT hardware manufacturing in the country. The major international players selected under the incentive scheme are Dell, Wistron, Rising Stars Hi-Tech (Foxconn) and Flextronics.

The domestic companies selected under the scheme are Lava International Ltd, Dixon Technologies (India) Ltd, Infopower Technologies (JV of Sahasra and MiTAC), Bhagwati (Micromax) Neolync, Optiemus, Netweb, Smile Electronics, VVDN and Panache Digilife.

The ICEA has been in deep discussions with the global brands such as HP, Dell, Apple, Wistron, Flex, Foxconn and their Electronics Manufacturing Services (EMS) companies to find ways to recast the IT manufacturing vision to unlock its full potential.

“The world’s top EMS companies are already in India and Indian companies are also learning to build electronics products for leading global OEMs. At ICEA, we are determined to make India the next global hub for electronics manufacturing in partnership with the government,” said Pankaj Mohindroo, Chairman, ICEA.

The PLI scheme for IT hardware, notified on March 3, extends an incentive of 4 per cent to 2 per cent/1 per cent on net incremental sales (over base year of FY20) of goods under target segments that are manufactured in India to eligible companies, for a period of four years (FY22 to FY25).

The IT Hardware committee by the ICEA includes powerful brands and EMS companies such as HP, Dell, Lava, Foxconn, Wistron and Flex.

“Lava is tying up with a significantly large global EMS company, which would bring the desired skills and scale” Mohindroo added.