Your next phone could cost more because of a chip you will never see. This year the iQOO 15 climbed from Rs 72,999 at launch to Rs 85,999, and the reason given was a memory chip shortage. India makes almost none of the chips that go into its phones, its cars or its appliances. On Friday, the government took its biggest step yet toward changing that, as Semicon 2.0 opened for applications.
Union Electronics and IT Minister Ashwini Vaishnaw launched the Semicon 2.0 web application portal in New Delhi on November 6, opening the second phase of the Semicon India Programme. Companies can now apply under three of the programme’s six strategic pillars. The Union Cabinet has approved the programme with an outlay of Rs 1,27,500 crore under the India Semiconductor Mission, according to a Press Information Bureau release.
What Semicon 2.0 actually funds
The programme is built around six pillars: chip design, machines and materials, fabrication units, assembly and testing, research and development, and talent. The portal is live for three of them. Pillar 2 covers the machines and materials that chip factories need. Pillar 3 covers setting up more fabrication plants, the fabs where chips are actually made. Pillar 4 covers ATMP and OSAT units, the assembly, testing, marking and packaging plants that finish a chip before it goes into a device.
The other three pillars, design, research and talent, are not open yet. Guidelines have been issued only for the three live pillars so far, and the government has not said when the rest will follow. That matters because a fab without Indian chip designers and trained engineers is still a factory running on imported know-how.
Twelve projects cleared on day one
The portal launch came with a second announcement. The Ministry of Electronics and IT cleared 12 more projects under the Electronics Components Manufacturing Scheme, with projected investment of Rs 7,503 crore. The projects are expected to generate production worth Rs 39,045 crore and create 7,127 direct jobs, the ministry said.
Look at what is actually being built and the shift becomes clear. The list covers multi-layer printed circuit boards, relays, heat sinks and specialty ceramics, plus supply chain materials like copper foil, anode material, cathode active material, polypropylene film and camera rims. These are the unglamorous layers underneath the chip itself, and India imports most of them today. MeitY Secretary S Krishnan said the approvals include the country’s first commercial cathode material manufacturing unit. Cathode and anode material also feed batteries, so this is as much an EV story as a chip story.
The 12 projects are spread across Gujarat, Karnataka, Madhya Pradesh, Maharashtra, Punjab, Tamil Nadu and Uttar Pradesh. With this batch, the scheme has now cleared 118 applications covering 34 products across 16 states, with expected investment of Rs 77,051 crore and direct employment for 81,755 people.
No room for time-pass applications
Vaishnaw used the launch to warn the industry plainly. The portal will accept only applications that are complete in all respects, he said, adding that there is no place for frivolous applicants and that only extremely serious players should participate. The message is aimed at the subsidy hunters who have circled every manufacturing scheme Delhi has launched in the last decade.
It has been a busy week for the ministry. The same IT Ministry is also weighing an end to social media safe harbour for large platforms, a proposal that would reshape how Facebook, Instagram, YouTube and X operate in India.
There is an early sign the filter is working. Around half of the units approved under the components scheme so far are small and medium enterprises, according to ETV Bharat, not just large conglomerates. Industry body IESA and SEMI India called the launch a milestone and noted the programme was notified within six weeks of Cabinet approval.
The number that decides everything
Phase one of the semiconductor programme approved 12 projects with cumulative investment of over Rs 1.64 lakh crore across six states. Five of them had started commercial production by October 2026, according to the government. That is the figure to keep in mind when the next round of announcements arrives. Portals and outlays are easy. Factories that actually produce are the hard part, and five out of twelve in commercial production is a real start, not a press release.
The test for Semicon 2.0 is simple. Will the three open pillars pull in fab and packaging proposals from companies that can actually build, and will the design, research and talent pillars follow quickly enough to staff them? If the answer is yes, the next time a memory shortage pushes phone prices up, India will have something to say about it. If not, the portal will be one more impressive website. The first applications will tell us which one it is.