MC EXCLUSIVE Mohali-based chip maker CDIL plans power semiconductor push, EVs in focus after nod from Centre

CDIL

Continental Device India (CDIL), a manufacturer of silicon chips and devices, which secured government nod last week for a new investment under the India Semiconductor Mission (ISM), plans to strengthen its position in the power semiconductor market with a sharp focus on the fast-growing automotive EV sector.

Prithvideep Singh, the General Manager at CDIL Semiconductors told Moneycontrol during an exclusive interaction that the proposed investment will add 16 crore devices annually to the company’s current capacity of 60 crore, deploying both silicon and silicon carbide technologies, areas where it already has strong in-house packaging expertise.

The Mohali-based chipmaker said it is preparing to ramp up its strategic partnership with Germany’s Infineon, and the first devices are expected to roll out within months. This quick expansion is backed by CDIL’s established infrastructure and existing customer approvals across multiple industries.

Under the tie-up, CDIL will integrate Infineon’s wafer technology and fabrication know-how with its own packaging and assembly capabilities in India. The collaboration will enable CDIL to deliver advanced, high-reliability products for domestic customers in automotive, EVs, solar, railways and other high-power consumption segments.

Edited excerpts:

Q: How do you think the support from the government is going to help CDIL, and what is your plan now?

This is not our first foray into semiconductors. We've been doing this for a long time, even over the last several decades, and our investments have continued. Just in the last five years, we installed three new lines between 2020, I think 2021, and 2024. So, we've been investing continuously, growing, and expanding in the semiconductor sector.

Earlier, it was either on our own or under the SPECS scheme that the government had before ISM, and now it’s with ISM. For us, it's an ongoing journey, and it’s wonderful to have the government’s focus on supporting companies like ours. We’ve been at this for a long time, and of course, we also support new entrants into this space. So, for us, this is just the next step in the continuing evolution of our investments and growth in the sector.

With this particular investment, we will now be looking at the power sector, specifically catering to automotive EVs, using both silicon and silicon carbide technology, which CDIL has packaging expertise for, developed in-house with our team.

In terms of the approval, all the technology is ours. It’s Indian technology, developed by CDIL with our team of engineers and experts. The project was cleared without any technology transfer from abroad because our technology had been proven before the ISM panelists and approval committees. They understood what we’ve been able to create in India with our own IP, which is at par with what exists globally today. So, it’s part of the ongoing evolution of our investments and growth.

This investment will be particularly focused on power semiconductors, using both silicon and silicon carbide technology.

Q: How will the expansion project under the ISM pan out?

CDIL currently has a capacity of around 600 million (60 crore) devices annually. This will add another 160 million (16 crore) devices. What’s interesting is that these are high-power devices - so beyond just the numbers, the value addition is significant. These are higher-cost products used in all kinds of electrification projects - solar inverters, household inverters, EVs, charging systems, railway segments - essentially wherever there’s high power consumption. That’s where the focus for these products will be.

Q: How is the Infineon partnership shaping up for CDIL?

The collaboration with Infineon is a very strategic one. Under this partnership, we will be working with Infineon’s wafer technology while using our packaging and assembly technology. Essentially, we’ll bring Infineon wafers and their fabrication expertise together with our packaging technology to create products in India. A lot of the packages and products we aim to produce under this new project will also benefit from this collaboration.

Q: Are there new customers on board who will be catered to through this partnership between the companies?

Infineon and CDIL are working together because both of us bring different strengths. CDIL has a strong reputation in the Indian market. We’re known for quality and reliability. We’ve been supplying space-grade components since the 1970s. We have device approvals from most of the leading automotive customers in the country. We’re also active in the power segment, railways, and consumer sectors.

So, we already have customers in place, packages in place, and our own in-house Indian technology. With Infineon, which is a global leader in many of its segments, the offering becomes even stronger. All of this is coming together for a very quick ramp-up. There’s no time wasted on building facilities from scratch — it’s plug-and-play. We expect the first devices from this project to be ready very soon, within a matter of months.

We’ll be making products using Infineon wafers as well as our wafer technology. CDIL had a fab for 35 years, and many of those processes were later moved to foundries, where we’ve been producing for the Indian market. These products are not sector-specific but quite sector-agnostic. Still, the major demand is in solar, inverters, EVs, and automotive areas, where we already have approvals.

In 2023, we signed an MoU with Luminous (now part of Schneider) to indigenize products. Whether it’s industrial, automotive, space and high-reliability, or railways, we are covering all the major segments. These products will be part of all those ecosystems.

So, anywhere electrification is happening - energy going into and coming out of a battery - that’s where we’ll focus on with our upcoming products.

Q: Are there plans to explore ties with other companies, similar to the Infineon partnership?

We’ve always had strong relationships with many vendors and customers. Not all can be disclosed publicly because of NDAs. As and when collaborations are ready to be announced, we will make them public. There are indeed several partnerships in place.

Q: Anything else you want to talk about in terms of focus areas later this year or next year that CDIL is planning?

There’s a huge project that has just been announced under the ISM, and we expect things to move very fast.