Channel Associations Welcome Make in India Suggestion for IT Products

Can and should Make in India be extended to the IT industry? Read on to find out.

In his first meeting on 6th of April with the Union Ministers after announcing the 21 days lockdown period, Prime Minister Narendra Modi urged the Cabinet Ministers to devise strategies to fight the Coronavirus on a war footing.  He suggested that this   was a moment to take the Make in India  initiative of the government further  and reduce dependence on imported products.

In a separate interaction by the DQ Channels with the IT Channel partners, the  partners expressed solidarity with the PM Modi's suggestion in the context of the IT products.

It is well known that the Indian IT products market is almost entirely dependent upon imports, mostly from China and transfer of technology from the Western countries,  from where the IT vendor companies  get the products manufactured in China and export to India. Because of this, during Coronavirus breakout, the imports from China and  other countries has completely stopped, leading  to a crisis in the IT products market. With the workforce  across the sectors working from home, there has been a sharp rise in the demand for the  IT products. In the initial phases, the Channel community met this sharp rise by selling off their stocks and by tying up with each other to keep the supplies running. However, with no imports coming  during the lockdown and because of the manufacturing units shutting down in China, the channel community has faced  a crisis in meeting the demand, as their is virtually no imports coming in.

At this moment, the PM's stress on Make in India has come as a welcome note  for the IT Channel community. CMDA and PCAIT, two major Channel associations in Delhi gave positive responses to this suggestion. They emphasised that the industrial houses, the finance sector and the people of India should act upon this suggestion and make it happen, as action is needed at this moment.  Make in India is the future of India.

"The announcement encapsulates the government’s ‘Make in India’ initiatives and the emphasis on self-reliance is commendable. The stimulus and relief packages will help India’s economy to overcome the negative effects of the lockdown. Technology-driven systems are one of the five key pillars of growth and will bolster the tech sector in its efforts to scale-up and support the economy. MediaTek is hopeful that these initiatives will further India’s growth towards becoming a digital economy."

--Anku Jain, Managing Director, MediaTek India

Responding to a query from DQ Channels, Manoj Khanna, Secretary, CMDA, Delhi said, "I think now the entire world must have realised the importance of domestic industry. It will take us minimum 3-5 years if we just start thinking on these lines. We need to start sourcing machines, raw materials and essential items only from outside the country and then only we can really make this dream come True of “Make In India”.   Besides, this is a lot of support from the Government. Banks, citizens, Corporates etc will be required to make it happen. Just words won’t make it happen."

Puneet Singhal, President, CMDA, supported this  comment.

Puneet Singhal, President, CMDA, further said,   "To encourage Make In India, the Government's purchase policies to go in for L1  needs to be amended for a span of at least 10 Years.  Also, what needs to change is the consumers' mindset to Buy Make in India Products. Celebrities from all fields should emphasise this change of buying habit and its associated nationalist advantage. In short, consume less, but only consume indigenous products even if expensive. "

Responding to the same query, Alok Gupta, President, PCAIT, said, "Now every county has realised that we need to be self-sufficient for our requirements. Anything which the country requires, should be produced or manufactured within the country. Not only IT, but in any industry, the country should be self-dependent. India is a software hub and software products and solutions should also be added in Make in India list. Make in India is the future of India."

Hemant Grover, Total Solutions, Delhi, responded to the query by saying, "Manufacturing still evokes a negative connotation despite Make in India call. Wish more should have happened on that front because of the regulations of the country/states. Even non high technology products are coming from China—this means something is wrong in our eco system. No reason is good enough.  There is absolutely no ecosystem for hardware here. The transition from prototyping to mass manufacturing is one of the hardest things for an entrepreneur in this space.    Multiple hardware technology parks are the need of hour including all engineering fields since they compliment  each other.    One needs to have well organised  manufacturing system with 95% of resources from within 10 Km area of the place, including the skilled/unskilled manpower required  with no swords on the head of business owner. (Skill development has been a great initiative by government  though faster speed should be the order of day."

In response to this query, Sanjeev Rajpal, another Channel Partner said,   "Make in India has already started some 4-5 years back.  We started taking baby steps almost half a decade back  . The results are visible now to an extent.  In IT, we see some basic peripherals , like keyboards, mouse, power supplies being made in India.  Most of cables are being made in India now, to the extent that domestic manufacturing is likely to replace majority of imports . In surveillance, cameras, drivers, cables , connectors, power supplies are being produced domestically now . With bigger corporations having confidence, we are in the threshold of a manufacturing boom albeit this crisis in which we are embroiled."

The responses  from the  Channel community show that they are well aware of the dynamics of the issue of Make in India  in the context of the IT products. Their stress on  changing on the mindset of the buyers and promoters to buy and promote Indian products is very significant, as without this the entire Make in India project will fall flat. Their responses also show that India is already producing many peripherals and now the need of the hour of to transition into making major products such as laptops, smartphones, security solutions etc. There is also a need o indigenous technological innovations. Indian tech professionals are leading the IT innovation, manufacturing and business all over the world. There is no reason why they can't lead it on their home turf. Hence, the suggestions from the Channel community that the IT products must be added to the Make in India list and  we need to start thinking about this in order to  be able to sell our own products in 4-5 years is very significant. Also significant is the suggestion that the IT products should not only be made in India, but should also be made for the specific Indian needs. The suggestion to give more incentives to manufacturers of Indian goods from Indian raw materials is also very insightful. It should be remembered that MAIT had earlier advocated Make in India.