Mindgrove Technologies, a fabless semiconductor company headquartered at the IIT Madras Research Park, has entered into a commercial partnership with Pinetics, a Pune-based electronic product design and development firm.
The two-year agreement marks the first time an India-designed chip will be integrated into commercial biometric access control systems, smart locks, and camera applications, with plans to expand across additional product categories, Mindgrove said.
The partnership addresses a persistent gap in India’s electronics value chain- the absence of commercially viable, domestically designed chips and modules in finished products. While India has established capabilities in PCB design and assembly, nearly all semiconductor components have been imported. This collaboration changes that.
Pinetics brings end-to-end ODM and design capabilities that extend Mindgrove’s silicon downstream. Mindgrove’s silicon is the foundation. Pinetics ensures it reaches the hands of product builders.
Mindgrove’s Secure IoT SoC, already taped out at 28nm and running at 700 MHz, is production-ready for smart connected devices including biometric systems, smart locks, meters, and PoS machines. Its Vision SoC, currently in development with support from India’s Design Linked Incentive scheme, is being built for high-performance edge computing and vision processing applications spanning CCTV cameras, dashcams, ADAS, and smart TVs.
“This partnership reflects the kind of industry adoption that makes India’s semiconductor ambitions real,” said Shashwath TR, Co-founder and CEO of Mindgrove Technologies. “When domestic product companies choose to build on Indian silicon, it accelerates the entire value chain. With Pinetics, we are putting an indigenous chip at the heart of products that millions of Indians use every day. We look forward to this being the first of many such collaborations,” he added.
“For a product design firm, the chip is the hardest dependency to localise,” said Navin Goyal, Co-Founder and CEO, Pinetics. “Working with Mindgrove changes that equation. We can now design modules around silicon that is developed in India, supported in India, and priced for the Indian market. For our customers in access control and security, this means faster iteration, stronger supply chain resilience, and a product story that resonates with where the industry is headed,” he added.