NEW DELHI: A section of multinational and local telecom gear makers said that the Department of Telecommunications’ (DoT) guidelines for the Production Linked Incentive (PLI) scheme, which caps R&D investment at only 15%, will only help companies that don’t plan on indigenous product development of telecom equipment, and will only lead to assembly.
They added that the scheme is skewed towards contract manufacturers at the cost of companies who are investing top dollars in R&D to develop the products.
“The challenge is that the guidelines will not really meet the ‘Atmanirbhar Bharat’ vision since it will lead to just assembly and not the real development of telecom products in India. They (the government) are capping R&D investment at just 15%. Thus, we can’t get a lot of more investments,” a senior executive with a leading home-bred equipment maker told ET, asking not to be named.
He added that capital investment should have been allowed in any form, sans land and building, and that investment shouldn’t have been restricted to just manufacturing plants and accessories.
The DoT had issued detailed guidelines last week while opening up applications for telecom equipment and networking products manufacturers to apply for the PLI scheme. Under the plan, 10 large manufacturers and 10 MSMEs will be selected to receive incentives worth Rs 12,195 crore over a five-year period by achieving stipulated production targets. Of this, Rs 1000 crore have been set aside for the…
