EPIC Foundation vows to bring back the lost glory for indigenous electronics products and brands

HCL Founder Dr. Ajai Chowdhry along with fellow HCL founder Arjun Malhotra and semiconductor industry veteran Dr. Satya Gupta had launched EPIC (Electronic Products Innovation Consortium) Foundation, a not-for-profit organization founded with the aim to revive India Electronics Industry by creating Indian products and Indian Brands for the Electronics products of national importance. The launch function was presided by Chief guest Dr. V.K. Saraswat, Member NITI Aayog, Shri. Jasmine Shah, Vice-Chairperson Dialogue and Development Commission of Delhi, Dr. Srivari Chandrasekhar, Secretary, Department of Science & Technology, Government of India, Shri Amitesh Kumar Sinha, Joint Secretary MEITY and the eminent guests from Industry, government, and Academia.

While launching the foundation, Dr. Ajai Chowdhry, Chairman EPIC Foundation, said the depth in manufacturing is a key requirement to gain self-reliance in the electronic industry, and a special thrust on designing locally can help achieve this. He said, “We are pleased to announce the launch of EPIC foundation. Our aim is to take Indian Electronics to real Atma Nirbharta, from design of Electronics products to Manufacturing and Design & Manufacturing of Semiconductor Chips. We will work closely with all Industry associations, academia, industry and government to achieve EPIC foundation’s mission. Government should have a special thrust on designing in every PLI scheme as this will only lead to depth in the manufacturing capabilities of India’s electronics manufacturing in the country.

He also added that in the last 10-15 years, many electronic brands like Micromax and Videocon have vanished. The reason as he sees it: Many global brands flooded the Indian market. These had volume, capability and funding–using which they upended the Indian electronic market, leading to significant loss for the industry. If we help design and build local brands, then these will ultimately feed into a semiconductor plan.

The Foundation was formed with two primary objectives- creating “Indian” Electronics products and “Indian” Brands in High-Impact/High-Volume categories and drive demand for Semiconductor Chips by scaling the volume for these Indian Electronics Products. As per the Foundation, over the last 3 decades Indian Electronics Brands and Products have seen a continuous decline and today, there are hardly any Indian brands and products in the high-volume electronics product categories. Today the market share of “Indian” products and Brands is less than 10% out of the $180 Billion market for electronics products.

Arjun Malhotra, Co-Chairman EPIC Foundation added, “Our mission at EPIC Foundation is to bring lost glory back for Indian Electronics products and brands. With a unique approach and strong support of Industry, academia and government, we are very confident to achieve this mission for creating Self-Reliance for Electronics in India.”

Dr. Satya Gupta, CEO, EPIC Foundation said, “We conceived the foundation with the intent to revive Indian Electronics Products and Brands with indigenous design and manufacturing. The Educational Tablet project and LED Chip project are very close to my heart as one addresses social empowerment of 1.3 Billion Indians and the other puts the wings to India’s Semiconductor Mission. It is very heartening to see overwhelming support to the EPIC Foundation from all parts of the Global ecosystem.”

The Foundation also announced two critical products-

1.    An Indian 10.1 Inch Tablet for Education and social empowerment with unique features of Repairability, Upgradability and AI/ML based inter-lingual translation for Indian Languages (Voice-2-Voice, Text-2-Text etc.) to support language diversity of India and inclusion of differently abled fellow citizens.

2.    An Indian LED Driver chip, which has 700 Million Units consumption and will reach a Billion Units in next few years. Supported by ELCOMA, the Top-10 LED product companies, manufacturers have agreed to buy this chip. The large number of silicon wafers and chips required for this project can help in reviving SCL Fab and create a huge business of upcoming India ATMP units.

For building a strong eco-system of partners, EPIC Foundation has signed a MoU with the government of Delhi for setting up an Electronics City in Delhi and working with other states for developing the Electronics Product Design and Manufacturing eco-system. A Strong partnership with Academia is essential and EPIC Foundation has signed MoUs with IIT Kanpur and IIT Madras. Industry associations are a very critical part of the Electronics & Semiconductor ecosystem. The major industry associations in the Electronics & Semiconductor domain, IESA, ELCINA, MAIT, ESSCI, ELCOMA are supporting EPIC Foundation’s mission. The foundation also donated 20 MilkyWay (Aakash-Ganga) Tablets each to The Blind Society of India and Deaf Society for Women.