MediaTek to Invest US$200 Million to Set up 2nd R&D Lab in India

MediaTek Inc., a major handset chip vendor, recently announced a plan to invest in US$200 million to open its second R&D center in India, aiming to develop presence in the world's second most-populated market.

According to Indian media, the new laboratory will open in Bengaluru, while the firm's first Indian laboratory operates in Noida.

MediaTek executives say the company is setting up the Indian laboratories to keep up with rapidly growing demand for mobile phones in India and Southeast Asia.

India has over 1.2 billion people to be a vast potential market for mobile phones. According to market consultant IDC, although the shipments of all types of mobile phones in India dropped 5% quarter on quarter to 632.1 million systems in Q2, 2014, shipments of smartphone surged 11% quarter on quarter and 84% year on year, to 184.2 million units in the meantime. The consultant forecasts smartphone shipments in the Southern Asian nation to  double each year at least until 2018.

According to IDC, India is vigorously developing homegrown smartphone brands. In Q2, 2014, Micromax, Karbonn and Lava were the No.2, No.3, and No.4 smartphone brands in India, seizing 18%, 8% and 6% of the Indian market, respectively. The No.1 brand is Samsung of South Korea while the No.5 is Motorola of the United States. Micromax is among MediaTek's biggest customers in India

MediaTek plans to recruit at least 100 specialists by the end of this year for the second laboratory and increase R&D engineers in India to 500 in five years.

India has drawn world leading chipmakers, including Intel, Qualcomm, Broadcom and MediaTek, to open R&D facilities there. According to a semiconductor industry association in India, the nation purchases around US$7 billion of semiconductors yearly and the market will scale up to approximately US$50 billion by 2020. (KL)