Vedanta Chairman, Anil Agarwal on Friday said that the company is in discussions with three technology partners for separate tie-ups for setting up a foundry,chip packaging, and testing facility, and a semiconductor fabrication unit.

Agarwal added that the company will start producing “make in India” chips in 2.5 years. He however indicated that the partnership with the technology companies will be concretised in a few months. Vedanta was previously hoping to set up a semiconductor fabrication unit with Taiwanese electronics company, Foxconn- however, the joint venture was scrapped last month.

Agarwal’s statements came at select media roundtable attended by businessline. 

Agarwal also indicated that the $20 billion investment plans to set up the fab are still on, the first tranch of investment by Vedanta will be $5 billion, for which they are well provisioned. ‘’Vendata has a good cash flow, we will make a capital allocation in Vedanta and there is a queue of people to give us equity and debt...but we want the tie-ups to be in place first, and have ecosystem,’‘ Agarwal said

Agarwal noted that the localisation of the semiconductor ecosystem will reduce the cost of electronics significantly. “From mobile phones to laptop, and television displays, the price of every unit will be reduced to “single digits,” said Agarwal.

In his inauguration speech Agarwal added that an affordable device will be a window to the world for India’s youth, especially young women. 

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