The Union Cabinet on Wednesday approved a Rs 7,350-crore scheme to boost production of laptops, tablets, all-in-one PCs and servers in the country, as it sought to woo global and domestic players to take advantage of India’s manufacturing prowess.
Production worth Rs 3.26 lakh crore and exports of Rs 2.45 lakh crore are estimated over the next four years under the new scheme, which is expected to create 1.80 lakh jobs, said Communications and IT Minister Ravi Shankar Prasad.
Briefing reporters after a meeting of the Cabinet, Prasad said the Production Linked Incentive (PLI) scheme has been approved for IT hardware products that would cover laptops, tablets, all-in-one PCs and servers. The Rs 7,350-crore scheme aims to promote India as a global hub for hardware manufacturing. The PLI push for hi-tech IT hardware gadgets comes close on the heels of the Cabinet last week clearing a Rs 12,195 crore scheme for telecom equipment manufacturing., he said.
An incentive scheme for mobile phone manufacturing was announced last year and has since garnered strong response from players despite the challenging times of the pandemic. The latest IT hardware scheme offers incentives between 4-1 per cent on net incremental sales (over base year 2019-20) of goods manufactured in India and covered under the target segment, to eligible companies, for a period of four years, an official statement said.
The PLI scheme is expected to enhance the development of electronics ecosystem in India, at a time when globally manufacturing is undergoing a shift and companies across the world are looking to diversify their manufacturing locations to mitigate the risk involved in depending on a single market, said Prasad detailing the PLI scheme.