Wipro announces collab with Intel Foundry for chip design innovation

IT services major Wipro, on Wednesday, announced an expanded collaboration with Intel Foundry in a bid to accelerate chip design innovation.

“As the key design services and alliance partner, Wipro will work with Intel Foundry

to accelerate the development of Intel’s most advanced process nodes, including the Intel18A process node,” the company said in a regulatory filing.

The collaboration comes amid rising demand for artificial intelligence chip manufacturing, Wipro said. While Wipro will support the partnership with design services, Intel Foundry is trusted with the manufacturing process, the statement further noted.

Focus on new startup markets in generative AI space

On the collaboration, Atul Kapur, the business head of HiTech at Wipro, said, "This new collaboration with Intel Foundry marks a significant step towards becoming a part of the semiconductor industry. This creates opportunities for Wipro and supports chip supply and chip manufacturing. Together, with Intel, we will deliver silicon devices to our clients with proven industry-standard flows and process technologies from Intel Foundry. We will be targeting new startup markets, especially in the Gen AI space, helping our clients further shorten the time to market.”

Commenting on the same, Rahul Goyal, the vice-president and general manager, product & design ecosystem enablement at Intel Foundry said, "We are delighted to have Wipro join us and demonstrate their readiness for our platforms at Intel Foundry Direct Connect. Wipro has a long history of delivering value across a range of industries, and we are excited to partner with them for the benefit of our mutual global customers.”

Modi govt's push for chip manufacturing

Notably, chip manufacturing is a key plank of the Narendra Modi government’s business agenda as India aims to become a global player in the field and grab a share from China and Taiwan. For this goal, the Centre has also offered $10 billion in incentives to the industry to start local chip manufacturing.

In January, Taiwan’s Foxconn announced partnership with tech firm HCL Group for a semiconductor assembly and testing facility in India. Tata Group, Reliance Industries are also among leading companies, exploring opportunities in the field.