ESC draws blueprint to accelerate HW growth

The Electronics and Computer Software Export Promotion Council (ESC), an autonomous organization under the Ministry of Information Technology, has charted a growth path that is believed to put India's fledging hardware sector on the fast track.

The ESC agenda will be to attract more FDI by promoting India as the choicest destination for relocating manufacturing bases. Countries like Singapore have made a conscious decision to relocate their manufacturing bases preferably to China and this is the time to leverage on such opportunities. Towards that end, the Council expects to participate in events abroad like CeBit, Hong Kong Electronics, Electronica in Europe and take delegations of small and medium entrepreneurs to destinations like UK, Germany, France and Korea.

The Council believes that if it has one or two big MNC companies setting up manufacturing base in the country it could be used a reference base to attract more companies.

Deepak Puri, Managing Director of Moser Baer, who has recently taken over as the Chairman of ESC is passionate about the promotion of hardware exports from the country. He believes that India should draw synergies from its software strength to develop the hardware sector. Indian entrepreneurs should outdo the Taiwanese at the game by adding value to hardware manufacturing. For that, in the immediate future, he envisages a scenario where importing all components be made free. These components could then be assembled and made intelligent by using software developed by Indians. The finished products could be targeted both at the domestic market as well as international markets. In the medium term, Puri believes that Indian entrepreneurs should manufacture the components themselves once the markets are established and the volumes are assured.

Another focus area of the Council would be to concentrate on the development of the small and medium companies. Today, of the total membership of 2,200 companies, around 1200 are small companies employing 2-3 people. These companies form the backbone of the industry says Puri drawing allusions to significance of the garage-entrepreneurs in the US economy which included the likes of HP and Microsoft. For that matter, his own company Moser Baer, which is today a Rs 1000 crore company, originated from a garage. The Council aims to promote this segment by taking delegations of 40-50 members to destinations abroad of which 70 percent of the cost would be borne by the Council.

The third area of focus would be to promote new products and explore new markets. New products could either be in the form of value-added finished products like the Israelis are doing i.e. focus on niche hi-tech products or beat the Taiwanese at their game by getting finances and doing the volumes. 

Indian electronics and IT exports are mainly targeted at the developed economies of the world totaling 90 percent of the business. The time has come to broadbase the destinations and look at newer geographies like Latin America, Middle East and Africa. In fact, the Council strongly feels that the Middle-East has a lot of business potential because of its spending power.

Cyber News Service