The Hindu : Business : Microchip bets on design centres

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Wednesday, Oct 17, 2007
ePaper

Business

Business

Microchip bets on design centres

Special Correspondent

BANGALORE: Microchip Technology, headquartered in the U.S., with FY 2007 global revenues of $1.040 billion, is viewing India as a potentially growing market for the company’s micro controllers built on 8-bit and more recently, 16-bit architecture.

“At present, India uses only one per cent of the global production of semiconductors while China’s share is estimated at 16 per cent. Going beyond revenue, our design centre in Bangalore, the second largest outside the U.S., indirectly contributes to our global sales through its share in microchip design work. We plan to have 150 products with 16-bit technology by March 2008,” Microchip Technology’s CEO and Chairman of the board, Steve Sanghi, told reporters here on Tuesday.

The potential market in India would be the automotive manufacturers with global brands, who would need to upgrade their production here to international standards to improve fuel efficiency. To meet this requirement, another design centre was now functioning in Pune, he said. The customer service centre in Bangalore was one among the company’s three such centre’s using English-speaking local talent. Microchip Technology also conducted regular training sessions for engineering college students in association with Indian institutions such as Anna University and Visvesvaraya Technological University.

Printer friendly page
Send this article to Friends by E-Mail

Business