India enters the story as China begins to rewrite the chips playbook

Any comparison between India’s and China’s semiconductor capabilities today is fundamentally misleading. China already possesses a vast chip manufacturing ecosystem spanning design, fabrication, packaging, testing, materials and increasingly equipment. India is only beginning to build its first meaningful semiconductor manufacturing base. One country is trying to push the frontiers of technological self-sufficiency while the other is still laying the foundations of an industry it has long lacked.

Yet two developments over the past week offer a glimpse into how the two Asian giants are approaching the semiconductor race from very different directions.