DIR-V has a serious presence in Indian electronics sector: MoS Rajeev

CHENNAI: Union Minister of State for Electronics and Information Technology, Rajeev Chandrasekhar said on Sunday that the Government of India is very committed to making the Digital India Reduced Instruction Set Computer-V (DIR-V) the Indian ISA (Instruction Set Architecture).

"The Government of India is very committed to making DIR-V the Indian ISA. While we may continue to have activities and programs in the x86/ARM space, we are almost all in the DIR-V Programs. All of the innovations and systems and technologies and capabilities that we need in the automotive IoT sensor space, mobility space and high performance computing space, our goal is to make sure that DIR-V has a serious presence in all of these three segments," Rajeev Chandrasekhar said while addressing the DIR-V Symposium here.

"Less than a decade ago, India was a consumer of technologies. India was a large market that consumed technologies and innovations that were innovated outside of this country and we were on the edges of this core deep tech ecosystem of semiconductors, electronics and high performance systems. It was in 2015, that this vision was laid out by our Prime Minister Narendra Modi that India must transform from a consumer of technologies to a country where our innovators and start-ups are architecting and designing platforms, solutions, systems, products and devices as much as any other nation in the world. Here we are, 15 months after the SEMICON program was launched, we are now talking about the future of DIR-V and how IIT Madras is fast becoming a hub for innovation, creativity and future systems around DIR-V," he added.

Speaking on the occasion, the Director of IIT-Madras V Kamakoti said that India is now on the cusp of releasing chips that can suit many requirements.

"Berkeley and MIT started RISC-V and they made it open source under a BSD license enabling users to customize it per their own requirements without encumbrances. IIT Madras joined this initiative around 2014 and we have made a lot of progress. We are now on the cusp of releasing chips that can suit many requirements. Thanks to many initiatives of the Government, I am sure that within the next few months to a year, we will see prototype chips and products coming out of our own microprocessor," added Kamakoti.

‘Digital India RISC-V Symposium’, a one-day event showcasing the ‘future of Electronics in India through the RISC-V pathway’ was organized on Sunday at IIT Madras Research Park here.

The Symposium featured insightful tech talks by esteemed academics and industry experts, interactive stalls showcasing indigenous RISC-V processors, an engaging hackathon, and a special investor meeting.

The Symposium was organized by the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology, Government of India, IIT Madras and IITM Pravartak Technologies Foundation.

The Government of India, taking concrete steps towards realizing the ambition of self-reliance and a momentous stride towards Atmanirbhar Bharat, launched the Digital India RISC-V Microprocessor (DIR-V) Program with an overall aim to create Microprocessors for the future in India, for the world and achieve industry-grade silicon and Design wins by December 2023.