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| Home > Outreach Services > TiE – ISB Connect |
| Semiconductor Track Summary |
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Participants
| Track Chair |
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Surya Hotha (Broadcom) |
| Moderator |
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Surya Hotha |
| Keynote Speaker |
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Aurangzeb Khan (Cadence) |
| Panellists |
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Bhavin Shah (JP Morgan) |
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Stacy Fender (Xilinx) |
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Dr Kumar Shiralagi (Intel Capital) |
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Kishore Manghnani (Marvell) |
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Venkat Vankayalapati (Cavera Systems) |
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B V Naidu (STP) |
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D Gude (AMD) |
Opportunities and challenges in the Semiconductor industry, particularly from an Indian perspective were the main themes discussed during this track. The session was kick started by Surya Hotha, from Broadcom, who talked about the Hyderabad Semiconductor special interest group as an initiative to support budding entrepreneurs interested in pursuing this vertical. The questions on everybody's mind were: Is the opportunity we talk about for real?" Does India have the potential, the talent pool, government support and the entire ecosystem to make this work?
Bhavin Shah, an analyst from JP Morgan, gave a candid presentation on the evolution of the industry to a point where specialisation was the means to success. While practically every South Asian country has tried its hand at semiconductors, only Taiwan and Korea have been able to create value. Korea focused on high volume memory chips and Taiwan has invested heavily in manufacturing, back end and foundry services. These being human capital-intensive operations, they have successfully used employee stock grants to keep the labor force motivated. Another factor that contributed to their success is the return of US trained semiconductor experts to Taiwan in the 80s, which India is experiencing now. While he wasn’t convinced about the manufacturing boom, he did conclude on an optimistic note by pointing to opportunities in specialized services such as solar cell manufacturing and IC design.
Aurangzeb Khan, VP of Market Development at Cadence Design Systems, was the keynote speaker and his message was, 'Convergence drives integration'. In the competitive environment today, a silicon manufacturer has to be capable of providing a system solution inclusive of software, drivers and reference designs. This was followed by a panel discussion which addressed a number of questions about entrepreneurial opportunities and sources for funding in the semiconductor sector.
Following is a brief from this discussion:
Q. What are the opportunities and challenges for the Indian Semiconductor industry?
Venkat: There are lots of opportunities for India in chip design and embedded design services, especially in communications, wireless, opticals, and applications.
Kishore: Do not restrict to India, look at it from a global perspective. VOIP services have grown tremendously in the last 2 years. The challenge is to figure out how these startups in India compete with others. Compared to the Taiwan companies, Indian start-ups had no presence in the US, but their local market was strong.
On the other hand in Israel, most of the semiconductor firms have a huge presence in the US. As per the current industry trends it is essential to have a presence both in India and the US.
Aurangzeb: An upcoming area is Lighting Technologies, thought it might not be as glamorous. That is yet another area which has huge growth opportunities.
Naidu: India has done well in services. The growing Indian manufacturing industry, the local market and the design base that most MNCs have in India provide the semiconductor industry in India the triple advantage to succeed.
Q. Where do you see the funding coming from for these new startups in India?
Naidu: To set up a semiconductor Design unit, it takes 20-25 million USD. The government provides aids in indirect forms such as exemption of corporate taxes. STPI has also taken up new programmes such as the incubation programme wherein the government invests up to 35% in building up of corporate infrastructure. Currently, Indians develop IP but don’t own it; we are encouraging Indian companies to file IP’s.
Q. What is the Xilinx Corporate VC fund about and how can it help entrepreneurs?
Stacy: We focus on areas where we can learn alongside the companies we support. We intend on funding ventures that are strategically aligned to our goals and that help propagate our ecosystem of programmable logic.
Q. On building Industry and Academia relations.
Kumar: Intel plans to train a million teachers on IT by 2010. Centers of Excellence have been set up at major institutes to improve the design curriculum and provide design tools.
Gude: Back in 1993, there was no VLSI talent in the country. I am proud to say that we established a college that focuses on design and produces the best of the breed.
Stacy: Xilinx has started a internship programme with IIT. They also offer VLSI and SMDP programmes in 32 different institutions.
Q. What advice would you give to budding entrepreneurs ?
Kishore: The core team of any entrepreneurial firm is very essential. Apart from this, a good source of capital and an established customer base is also critical.
Gude: One doesn’t need to have a large source of money. One can build small subsystems or sell an idea at first, then reinvest the revenues to build larger businesses.
Aurangzeb: Try and develop skill sets that set you apart from others.
Kumar: Intel Capital looks for businesses that pose as a good financial return opportunity and as a strategic opportunity. A few companies that Intel Capital has invested in are Tejas Networks, Insilica and Vignyani. Intel has also focused on educational and rural PCs.
The session ended on a positive note where everyone agreed that there is an opportunity, be it in design services or testing services or manufacturing, etc. Problems such as building a talent pool, an ecosystem and funding need to be addressed to ensure success. |
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