Semicon to grow 30 percent in India: Softjin

CIOL: What is the overall market size of the Indian semicon industry?

Kamal Aggarwal: As per ISA-Frost and Sullivan report, the market for semiconductor consumption in India was about US $2.8 billion in 2005. Also, as per the same report, the semiconductor design and embedded design industry in India generated revenues of $3.25bn in 2005.

CIOL: What would be the key drivers for the segment?

KA: There are two sides -- semiconductor consumption and semiconductor design. The key drivers for semiconductor consumption in India is the growth in consumption of electronics products such as mobile phones, PCs, wireless infrastructure, TVs and other home electronics.

The key drivers for semiconductor design in India include high-quality and affordable design talent, short product lead-times, good educational base leading to trained manpower.

Globally, the semiconductor market is expected to grow close to 10 percent during 2007. In India, it is likely to grow much faster due to high growth in electronics consumption. In terms of semiconductor design, I would expect that the growth will be in the region of 30 percent.

CIOL: Would you elaborate on some of the key developments in semiconductors in the country w.r.t. FY 2006-07?

KA: Well, the number of semiconductor companies -- both fabless and IDMs -- who have been setting up India design centers to tap the VLSI design talent has increased during FY 2006-07 as can be seen in the growth of memberships of companies in ISA.

Also, some other parts of the semiconductor ecosystem, such as semiconductor manufacturing, has received a lot of attention during FY 2006-07 with a number of announcements. The electronic design automation (EDA) industry in India -- both the market of EDA tools as well as EDA tool development activity -- has also increased at the same pace as that of the semiconductor design industry.

CIOL: How is Softjin positioned to serve the needs of the Indian semicon industry?

KA: As SoftJin, we are an electronic design automation (EDA) company providing unique EDA solutions to the semiconductor industry. Our core capability lies in developing innovative EDA tools for the specific requirements of our customers. Our business model is a 'hybrid' model, which is a mix of services and products.

Our services can be broadly classified as outsourced R&D services for the semiconductor industry. Our core services are developing new and innovative EDA tools for the specific requirements of semiconductor companies and other EDA product companies.

Our current products are licensable EDA building blocks that can be used as part of providing an EDA solution to our customers in post-layout and logic synthesis technology area within the EDA realm.