Teradyne eyes India's growing semiconductor testing equipment market

Teradyne expects demand for semiconductor testing equipment to rise as global companies, OSAT firms and chip design startups expand operations in India, says country manager Alpa Sood

Semiconductor testing equipment designer and manufacturer Teradyne has begun seeing demand from global companies setting up silicon chip research and development centres in India, as well as from existing outsourced assembly and testing (OSAT) companies and chip design startups, the company’s country manager, Alpa Sood, said.

 

The Massachusetts, US-headquartered company, which recently opened its India office in Bengaluru, believes demand for capital equipment, especially for semiconductor chip testing, will grow as the entire ecosystem expands over the next five to ten years.

 

“The multinational companies bring the experience which is required for the home-grown OSATs to be known for their reliability and qualifications. Similarly, the Indian fabless companies get the experience from the existing ecosystem of multinational companies,” Sood told Business Standard.

 

In the short term, Teradyne will support the needs of companies involved in testing and packaging silicon chips and align its employees' skill sets accordingly, Dominic Viens, vice-president and general manager of the power test division at Teradyne, said.

 

“Right now, the demand for support is in the power electronics area. Over time, it may move into higher-complexity areas such as radio-frequency or compute devices. We will have to make sure that we are one step ahead of having the right personnel trained for these areas to help our customers,” Viens said.

 

Though there is a global crunch of trained manpower across the semiconductor equipment ecosystem, in countries such as India, where the ecosystem is being built from the ground up, Teradyne is also looking to partner with higher education institutions, he said.

 

“Even right now at our Bengaluru centre, we have a laboratory space where testers can come and work. We have training spaces where people can be trained,” Sood said.

 

The need for talent, however, is also likely to be met by students from technical schools and colleges in tier-II and tier-III cities and towns, she said.

 

“There also seems to be a wave of expats who are returning to India, which really brings a lot of experience and talent. They are happy to return to their home country and train a new workforce. So we need to take advantage of that as well,” Viens said.