Chennai declared world's cheapest FDI location for electronics R&D

Chennai emerged as the cheapest location in top 100 electronics FDI destinations, with estimated annual operating costs of $1.24 mn for a 50-person R&D centre

In a major boost to the Tamil Nadu government’s push for new investments, Chennai was ranked as the world’s cheapest foreign direct investment (FDI) location for electronics research and development.

According to an assessment conducted using fDi Benchmark, an investment location comparison tool, Chennai emerged as the cheapest location in the top 100 electronics FDI destinations, with estimated annual operating costs of $1.24 million for a 50-person R&D centre. Malaysian city of Penang took the second spot with a cost of $1.32 million, followed by Gurgaon  with $1.52 million and Pune with $1.53 million,

Among the world’s competitive locations, Chennai was ranked second, only after Seol, which is home for large campuses of players like Samsung and LG Electronics. Chennai was followed by Chinese cities like Guangzhou and Shenzhen. Three Indian cities – Bangalore, Pune and Gurgaon – grabbed a spot among the top 10 cities in this list.

This comes as a positive for Tamil Nadu government that led to an increase in FDI by 41.5 per cent during April to December period and is taking steps to attract more investors by organising a global investors meet in 2023. A senior government official told Business Standard that the state has seen a $50 billion investment through memoranda of understanding, starting 2019.

According to Chief Minister M K Stalin, the state has signed 130 MoUs for investments to the tune of Rs 68,375 crore to generate 205,802 jobs since the DMK came to power 10 months ago. During the recent UAE trip by Stalin, the government grabbed investments to the tune of around Rs 6,000 crore.