The IT industry has always been the largest and most promising plot of India’s rapid innovation in the high-tech industry. But today, IT is no longer the sole face of a global India. Many companies have drawn their attention to the hale and hearty embedded design industry. In fact, the Indian semiconductor and embedded design industry is projected by the India Semiconductor Association (ISA) and market researcher Frost & Sullivan to grow from $3.25 billion in 2005 to $14.42 billion in 2010 and further to $43.07 billion in 2015.
The largest component of India’s design market is embedded software – poised to soar from $2.53 billion in 2005 to $36.34 billion in 2015 – followed, by a huge gap, by VLSI design and hardware/board design, respectively. As embedded systems approach ubiquity and are getting complex, focusing on software is no longer viable. The next key milestone for companies is to move up the embedded value chain by delivering full system designs. With a thrust on leading-edge technologies, Indian companies are now gradually taking the role of co-innovator and provider of embedded design IP and end-to-end solution environment.
Over a decade ago, the major obstruction in India’s embedded value chain had been the lack of large-scale manufacturing facilities. But this wall is no longer present. The growing number of EMS companies in the country has resulted to Indian companies partnering with these firms to provide complete product offerings for the local and overseas markets. The current focus of these companies is to deliver embedded designs for the automotive, digital security, medical, wireless and mobility, and consumer electronics market segments.
In this supplement, many will attest that India already plays a major role in the embedded design arena. TCS has recently announced that it will invest $10 million to set up a dedicated Innovation Lab for embedded systems research, while Freescale will expand its Center of Excellence for Wireless and Mobility Software in India. It won’t be long before the world will turn into India for complete embedded solutions.
