The government has notified Production Linked Incentive (PLI) Scheme for automobile and auto components after approving it on September 15. The PLI Scheme aims to overcome the cost of disabilities and encourage the industry to make fresh investments to make advanced auto products. It is estimated that in five years, this PLI Scheme will lead to fresh investments of over Rs 42,500 crore (€8.5 billion), and incremental production of over Rs 2.3 lakh crore (€27 billion). It will create additional jobs of over 7.5 lakh jobs and enhance India's share in the global automotive trade

Top trade and technology bodies from the US and UK have told the Indian government to adopt the 5G standards that have been recommended by the 3GPP. India is currently in confusion about which 5G standard it should go with - 5Gi developed by Telecommunications Standards Development Society, India (TSDSI) or the 3GPP developed 5G standard. The top international trade bodies have urged the Indian government to go ahead with 3GPP standards which will give a much-needed push to electronic manufacturing in India as companies will be encouraged to set up their operations in India.  “By using globally harmonized standards such as those from 3GPP, companies can set up manufacturing operations in India with the confidence that they can easily serve both the Indian market and export to global markets,” the bodies said in a joint submission letter to the Department of Telecommunications (DoT) and the Telecommunications Engineering Centre (TEC). 

During the pandemic, India has reported the highest increase in the use of AI at 45%, as compared to other major economies (the US at 35%, the UK at 23 % and Japan at 28 %). In fact, AI startups in India attracted total funding of $836.3 million in 2020. Also, despite the total number of high-value funding shrunk, the companies that received funding almost doubled in 2020 compared to 2019,” according to homegrown independent Transaction Advisory firm, RBSA Advisors. According to the study titled ‘Artificial Intelligence & Its role in Delivering Economic Value to Indian Enterprise, investment in AI has accelerated in India during the pandemic and the country has a potential to be a global epicentre of AI. IT services and technology sectors contribute to more than 60% of the AI market, followed by BFSI, engineering and retail.

An ambitious incentive scheme worth up to Rs 12,000 crore (€1.4 billion) is in the works to encourage companies to set up data centres in the country. The govt. is targeting an investment of Rs 3 lakh crore in the next five years as part of the hyperscale data centre scheme and is planning to provide between 3% and 4% of capital investment as incentive to companies, along with real estate support and faster clearances. Vision is to “make India a global data centre hub” and termed the scheme’s target as the largest so far in terms of expected investment in the country over a period of just five years.

Tata Power-DDL and AutoGrid are jointly launching a behavioural demand response program for company’s residential customers to reduce peak demand and network capital costs. This pilot project aims to empower customers, by helping them understand their consumption patterns and evaluate the effectiveness of demand response (DR) programs. AutoGrid is a global leader in AI-based energy management solutions, to undertake joint project around demand response (DR), distributed energy resource management (DERMS), electric vehicles (EVs), virtual power plants (VPPs), energy storage optimization, flexibility management, forecasting, and renewable integration. Tata Power-DDL and AutoGird both will strive to develop and deploy cutting-edge energy management technologies to optimize usage for the larger benefit of Tata Power-DDL customers.

A collaborative model from industry to map best innovation practices will take India to the league of top 25 countries in the Global Innovation Index from the 48th rank in 2020 and make it the innovation powerhouse of the world, Commerce & Industry Minister said. Minister announced 80% reduction on fee for filing of IPRs for all recognised educational institution in India and abroad. The key achievements highlighted by Goyal include granting of 28,391 patents in 2020-21 as compared to 4,227 grants during 2013-14 (572% growth), reduction in time of patent examination from 72 months in December 2016 to 12-24 months in Dec 2020 and 1.42 million trademark registrations in last four years in comparison to 1.1 million during the previous 75 years (1940-2015).

On the 75th Independence Day, Prime Minister formally announced the launch of National Hydrogen Mission to push plans to generate carbon-free fuel from renewable. He also has set a target of 2047 for India to achieve self-reliance in energy. India can achieve self-reliance in energy through a mix of a gas-based economy, blending 20 % ethanol in petrol and moving towards electric mobility. India has achieved the target of 100 gigawatts of renewable energy capacity ahead of the set target. Indian Oil Corporation (IOC) is working on technology to develop hydrogen-spiked compressed natural gas or H-CNG.