CMC, Xilinx mull R&D unit spin-off

CMC Ltd, a Tata group company, and the US-based $1.6 billion Xilinx, are looking at spinning off their joint research and development and design facility, Xilinx-CMC India Development Centre, into a separate company where both would have stakes mutually decided upon.

Xilinx is also considering the possibility of taking over the Bangalore-based development facility in which CMC would remain a technological partner. Under this scheme, the centre would be converted into a wholly owned subsidiary of Xilinx in India.

"We have plans for the R&D facility we have set up and nothing is being ruled out explained," said Richard W Sevcik, executive vice-president, programmable logic solutions, Xilinx.

"Both these possibilities are not being ruled out. However we would not like to disclose our plan of action for the Centre as of now," he added.

"The R&D centre as of now is a department of CMC which in technical collaboration with Xilinx develops solutions for Xilinx's as well as CMS customers. The IP rights of the solutions and programmes, however, remain with Xilinx. Both CMC and Xilinx have decided to ramp up R&D activities at XCIDC by taking the total number of design engineers to 400 by the next couple of years," explained Akshya Prakash, managing director, XCIDC.

CMC is also using its presence in segments of the industry to market Xilinx products while acting as a development base for Xilinx worldwide, which is working on designs for overseas customers.

XCIDC has also taken up initiatives to familiarise field programming gate array -- a design system, which is used as a platform to design chips, with technical institutes such as IIT Kharagpur, BITs Pilani, IIT Mumbai.

The company has also been providing hardware and software development kits to these universities and colleges to familiarise the subject with students as well as teachers.

Talking about the prospect of FPGA in India, Sevcik said, "As of now India provides a small $100 million size in terms of turnover. This is, however, expected to grow manifold in the next few years." Xilinx also did not rule out the possibility of fabricating chips in India.

"Xilinx sources its fabricator requirements from partner companies and in the next few years when India provides the critical mass for manufacturing, we would also out source it from India," he said.

Asia Pacific along with Japan provides for as much as 40 per cent of Xilinx's revenue and the company has large development plans for the country.