Key Points
Already, influential critics are asking if the much-touted success in becoming a hub for smartphone manufacturing is a hollow claim..
Low-end assembly-line jobs, created with the help of expensive state subsidies and protectionist import duties, would only make sense if they were a quick pathway to more sophisticated production, such as of microprocessors...
To that end, a likely rejection by the government of incentives for the 28-nanometer chip unit proposed by Indian billionaire Anil Agarwals Vedanta Resources Ltd. and Taiwans Hon Hai Precision Industry Co., also known as Foxconn, is not a good look...
A $3 billion proposal that had Israeli foundry Tower Semiconductor Ltd. as a tech partner has also stalled, while a third plan is stuck because Singapore-based IGSS Ventures Pte wants to resubmit its application for incentives, Reuters reported this week..
Maybe its just as well that Agarwal, who boasted of creating a self-reliant Silicon Valley in Modis home state of Gujarat, couldnt find a technology partner in nine months, or that Hyundai Global Motors, selected for a battery subsidy, turned out to be a case of mistaken identity it had nothing to do with the South Korean carmaker..
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