Exploiting the Potential of Indian Telecom R&D Together - The Way Forward

The Government of India has been taking various initiatives to promote R&D and strengthen indigenous manufacturing ecosystem in the country as envisioned under “Atmanirbhar Bharat”. Many policy measures have been taken by the Government like Preference to Make in India (PMI), Production Linked Incentive (PLI) and Digital Communication Innovation Square (DCIS) to promote startups, establishment of 5G Testbed, etc. A total of 31 companies including both domestic and overseas manufacturers have been finalized by the Department of Telecommunications (DoT) for providing PLI incentives. Similarly, 17 Startups have been provided initial funding by DoT to help them scale up their innovation and become market-ready. 5G Testbed developed by a consortium of IITs/IISc is ready for use by ecosystem partners. C-DOT, the premier R&D center of the Government of India is also being supported by DoT to carry out R&D in relevant technologies, as required by the country.

Individually, each of these entities have their own unique strengths and are exceling in their own way. However, there is a huge scope for collaboration amongst various stakeholders in the telecom manufacturing eco-system. Collaboration by leveraging each other’s complementary strengths can accelerate indigenous manufacturing as well as boost exports to other countries.

C-DOT has been working on the state-of-the-art Telecom technologies with its path breaking designs and innovations and is committed to working with the ecosystem partners to support “Make in India” and “Atmanirbhar Bharat” initiatives. As a part of this, C-DOT offers various products/services including 4G/5G equipment, Optical solutions, Broadcasting solutions, Wireless solutions and Networking solutions to entire Indian ecosystem for promoting indigenous manufacturing as well as taking R&D initiatives further to fulfil Hon’ble Prime Minister’s vision of “Atmanirbhar Bharat”, and eventually exporting India-made technologies abroad.

DoT has constituted PLI Mission with the objectives to grow domestic production, value addition, work with PLI partners in indigenisation of major components, sub-assemblies and facilitate development of vendor ecosystem.

This workshop aims to bring together various stakeholders on a common platform to understand the strengths and weaknesses in the eco-system and arrive at measures required to address the underlying challenges. In particular, the key focus is on leveraging the expertise of C-DOT by the Indian manufacturing/Startup ecosystem to develop technologies in the country as well as improve speed to market.