Infineon teams up with India’s CDIL to explore business in light EVs, energy storage solutions | TechCrunch

Infineon Technologies, Germany’s leading semiconductor manufacturer, has partnered with India’s six-decade-old chipmaker CDIL Semiconductors to tap into emerging business opportunities in the South Asian nation. The partnership aims to support India’s transition to electric mobility and renewable energy, both of which rely heavily on power semiconductors.

India, the world’s most populous country with over 1.4 billion people, aims to expand its EV penetration from the existing 7-8% to 30% and boost non-fossil energy generation from 100GW to 500GW by 2030. However, achieving these ambitious targets requires a robust domestic ecosystem for EVs and battery storage solutions that are cost-competitive with traditional alternatives to drive consumer adoption. Manufacturers in these sectors also seek high-quality inputs at comparable prices to keep their costs low. Infineon and CDIL aim to address all this with their tie-up.

As part of the collaboration, Infineon is supplying wafers to CDIL, which will package and assemble them at its Mohali facility in Punjab. The final products will serve Indian customers in sectors such as light EVs — including electric two- and three-wheelers — and renewable energy products like solar inverters and energy storage systems.

Initially, CDIL General Manager Prithvideep Singh told TechCrunch that the partnership aims to produce MOSFETs (metal-oxide-semiconductor field-effect transistors), which function as electronic switches to control electricity flow in devices ranging from smartphones to electric cars. However, CDIL plans to expand production by using Infineon’s wafers to develop IGBTs (insulated-gate bipolar transistors) over time. These components regulate high-voltage electricity in EVs and renewable energy systems.

CDIL’s semiconductor packaging facility currently has an annual capacity of 600 million power semiconductor units. Both companies see this as sufficient for now, though Singh noted that CDIL could scale production based on future demand.

Instead of traditional silicon, the semiconductors produced in India will use materials such as silicon carbide and gallium nitride, which offer greater heat resistance and provide more power density in a small space. CDIL has been working specifically on silicon carbide for the last four years and has even exported the material to countries including China.

However, Singh told TechCrunch that the Infineon partnership is currently focused on serving domestic demand.

“The wafer is like an engine. It is one critical component. And then, of course, you have the rest of the car, so it’s a good mix of both,” he said while elaborating on the partnership.

Notably, this is Infineon’s first manufacturing partnership in India, though the company has had a subsidiary in the country for some time and has been exploring the market actively for the last few months. The company’s executives even met with Indian government officials last year to discuss opportunities in power semiconductors.

“We believe that India is still in the more early stage of an exponential curve, but we do believe that this market will accelerate significantly in the next few years because a lot of trends start to overlap… you have the electrification and batterification of everything,” said Richard Kuncic, Infineon’s senior vice president and general manager for power systems, in an interview with TechCrunch.

The Neubiberg-headquartered company manufactures wafers at three major facilities located in Villach (Austria), Dresden (Germany), and Kulim (Malaysia).

India aspires to become a global semiconductor hub and announced billions of dollars in investments in this space last year. However, Infineon has no immediate plans to establish a wafer manufacturing site in India. Instead, the company is looking to form additional partnerships in the Indian market to grow its presence.

“We are not starting five things just for the sake of it… we are doing one after another,” Kuncic said when asked about potential collaborations with other local players.