PCB Manufacturing in India: Made in India, Down to the Board

For years, India's electronics manufacturing story has been visible in finished products, from smartphones and industrial equipment to automotive electronics, medical devices, and connected systems.

But the next chapter lies deeper inside those products.

India has demonstrated that electronics can be manufactured and assembled at significant scale. Electronics production reached approximately ?13.11 lakh crore in FY2025–26(1), up from ?11.32 lakh crore a year earlier—a 15.8% year-on-year increase. Electronics exports reached approximately ?4.24 lakh crore, or US$47.96 billion, making electronics India's third-largest export category.

The bigger question now is: how much of what goes inside those products can also be manufactured domestically?

That brings the printed circuit board into focus.

PCB manufacturing in India is becoming an important part of the country's transition from final-product assembly towards deeper component manufacturing, greater engineering capability and stronger domestic value addition.

For electronics to become more deeply Made in India, manufacturing increasingly has to go all the way down to the board.

India’s Electronics Story Is Moving Deeper

India's electronics sector has changed dramatically over the past decade.

Electronics production has grown nearly sevenfold from about ?1.9 lakh crore in 2014–15 to ?13.11 lakh crore in 2025–26. Over the same period, exports increased roughly elevenfold—from around ?38,000 crore to ?4.24 lakh crore.

The ecosystem now supports approximately 25 lakh jobs, according to government estimates. More than 40 major component manufacturers have also established or expanded operations in India.

These figures demonstrate manufacturing scale.

But scale and depth are not the same thing.

Industry estimates cited by the Government of India put domestic value addition in electronics manufacturing at around 18–20%(1). That leaves considerable scope to manufacture more components, materials, sub-assemblies and production inputs within the country.

A deeper electronics value chain looks something like this:

Finished electronics ? assemblies ? components ? bare PCBs ? materials ? manufacturing equipment and processes

PCBs sit close to the centre of this transition.

Why Do PCBs Matter to the Made in India Story?

Printed circuit boards are fundamental to almost every modern electronic system, which makes domestic PCB capability strategically important to a deeper electronics manufacturing ecosystem.

PCBs provide the physical structure and electrical interconnections needed to bring processors, sensors, memory devices, power components, connectors and other electronic parts together.

They are used across automobiles, industrial automation, medical devices, telecom equipment, defence electronics, consumer products, renewable-energy systems and countless other applications.

The opportunity therefore extends far beyond the PCB industry itself.

As these sectors expand, their demand for reliable boards expands with them.

Importantly, India’s PCB manufacturing journey is not starting from scratch. Companies such as PCB Power have been part of the country’s PCB ecosystem for more than 30 years, supporting engineers, businesses and electronics manufacturers with domestic PCB fabrication capabilities well before the current wave of investment and policy support.

As the ecosystem now expands further, this existing manufacturing experience provides a foundation on which newer capabilities and technologies can develop.

For readers looking to understand the technical side of PCB fabrication and the design guidelines involved before production, PCB Power already has dedicated resources.

The bigger question, then, is not whether PCB manufacturing exists in India, but how much further the country's capabilities can grow in scale, complexity, and technological depth.

PCB Manufacturing in India: The Opportunity in Numbers

The scale of the opportunity becomes clearer when India's PCB demand is compared with domestic production.

Currently, as per Avendus’ report, India’s bare PCB market is estimated at approximately US$5 billion(3), with around 88% of the market dependent on imports. 

Going forward, bare PCB demand is projected to grow at approximately 20% annually, while domestic bare PCB manufacturing is expected to grow at around 45% CAGR over the next five years, driven by increasing localisation, rising demand for locally manufactured PCBs, and growing domestic manufacturing capabilities, which are expected to gradually reduce India’s dependence on imports.

The numbers are significant because import dependence is not only about where a board is purchased.

When manufacturing happens elsewhere, much of the associated process knowledge, supplier development, manufacturing employment and technical capability is also built elsewhere.

Greater PCB fabrication in India can gradually expand the domestic ecosystem around materials, equipment, testing, process engineering and quality systems.

That makes the opportunity bigger than import substitution.

It is also an opportunity for manufacturing capability creation.

From Assembly Success to Component Manufacturing

India has already shown what localisation can look like at the finished-product level.

Around 99.2% of mobile phones sold in India are now manufactured domestically(1), according to government data. Mobile-phone production increased from around ?18,000 crore in 2014–15 to approximately ?6.27 lakh crore in 2025–26.

That success creates another question:

Can India replicate parts of that transformation deeper inside the product?

This is where components such as PCBs become important.

The aim is not simply to assemble a device domestically while continuing to depend heavily on imported components. Increasing domestic value addition requires more of the electronics value chain to develop locally.

That includes the bare board itself.

What Should a “Made in India PCB” Really Mean?

A Made in India PCB should ultimately represent more than the geographical location of a factory.

It should increasingly represent manufacturing capability.

That means producing boards consistently, managing complex requirements, maintaining process control, meeting quality expectations and working closely with product-development teams.

It also means recognising that PCB technologies vary considerably.

Single- and double-sided PCBs do not present the same manufacturing challenges as dense multilayer, flexible or HDI boards.

Avendus notes that Indian manufacturers are increasingly moving towards multilayer, flex and HDI PCBs, reflecting the opportunity to move higher up the technology and value curve.

Engineers looking for detailed production limits and board specifications can refer directly to PCB Power's existing technical resources.

For the wider Indian industry, the real measure of progress will be whether domestic manufacturing expands not only in volume, but also in technical complexity and repeatability.

PCB Investment Is Beginning to Reflect That Shift

The change is also visible in manufacturing investment.

In June 2026, foundation stones were laid in India for electronics manufacturing projects worth approximately ?6,750 crores(3), including projects focused on the production of advanced multilayer PCBs. 

The Ministry of Electronics and IT highlights an estimated ?40,000 crore worth of PCBs currently associated with import dependence, underlining the scale of the localisation opportunity.

This does not mean imports will disappear immediately.

PCB supply chains involve materials, machinery, chemicals, specialised processes and technologies that have taken decades to develop in established Asian manufacturing centres.

But new investments show that PCB manufacturing in India is moving from an industry opportunity on paper towards physical manufacturing capacity.

What Can Stronger PCB Fabrication in India Change?

For Engineers and Product Development Teams

PCB development rarely moves directly from a CAD file to final production.

Designs are reviewed, prototypes are tested, manufacturing constraints emerge and revisions are made.

A stronger domestic manufacturing base can give engineers more opportunities to interact directly with fabrication teams during these cycles.

Detailed design-for-manufacturing requirements are already available in PCB Power's existing resource.

For Electronics Companies

Local fabrication adds another sourcing option alongside international suppliers.

Depending on the board, quantity and technical requirements, proximity can support easier communication, shorter logistics chains and faster technical coordination.

However, “domestic” should never automatically be interpreted as “cheaper” or “faster.”

Materials, board complexity, manufacturing capacity and production volumes still determine commercial outcomes.

The real advantage is a broader and more capable local supplier ecosystem.

For the Wider Electronics Ecosystem

PCB factories create demand beyond the board itself.

They need laminates, copper, chemicals, manufacturing equipment, software, inspection technologies, logistics and skilled people.

Each additional layer that develops locally increases the depth of the ecosystem.

This is how electronics manufacturing begins moving from a collection of factories towards an interconnected industrial base.

Capacity Alone Will Not Make India Competitive

New factories are important, but manufacturing capacity alone does not guarantee competitiveness.

PCB production depends heavily on repeatability, process control and yield.

As boards become denser and more complex, manufacturers must maintain control across multiple production stages while consistently achieving customer specifications.

Materials and Supply Chains

A bare PCB depends on laminates, copper foil, prepregs, chemicals, surface-finishing materials and several other inputs.

If most of those remain imported, fabrication can occur domestically while significant upstream dependence remains.

This is why investment extending into materials such as copper-clad laminates is important for deeper localisation.

Engineering Talent

Machines provide capability only when skilled people can operate and optimise them.

PCB manufacturing needs knowledge across materials, plating, drilling, lamination, imaging, inspection, testing and manufacturability.

India's wider electronics ecosystem already supports approximately 25 lakh jobs, but component-level expansion will require increasingly specialised manufacturing skills.

Quality and Repeatability

Industries such as automotive, industrial electronics, telecom, medical technology and defence can place demanding reliability requirements on electronic hardware.

The challenge is therefore not simply making a board once.

It is producing it consistently, repeatedly and within specification.

India Is Not Starting From Zero

The discussion around domestic PCB manufacturing can sometimes make it sound as though the industry is only now beginning.

It is not.

Indian PCB manufacturers already serve engineers, startups, OEMs, institutions and established electronics businesses.

PCB Power, for example, already manufactures rigid and flex PCBs with published capabilities extending to 24 layers, alongside multiple materials, controlled impedance and other production requirements.

The current investment cycle should therefore be viewed as an opportunity to expand and deepen an existing manufacturing base.

Existing manufacturers contribute experience.

New investments add scale.

Material and component ecosystems can add resilience.

More advanced manufacturing processes add engineering depth.

India will need all of them.

Where Does Bare PCB Manufacturing Fit?

Bare PCB manufacturing produces the physical circuit board before electronic components are mounted onto it. PCB assembly comes afterward, when components are placed and soldered onto the fabricated board.

That distinction matters in India's localisation story.

Assembly adds substantial manufacturing value, but moving further upstream into bare PCB manufacturing develops another layer of industrial capability.

PCB Power maintains dedicated resources covering SMT, THT, and PCBA processes. You can also review our technical capabilities to gain a broader understanding of our PCB manufacturing expertise.

For India, both fabrication and assembly matter.

But developing more of the bare-board ecosystem brings the electronics value chain one important step further upstream.

Made in India Has to Go Down to the Board

India's electronics-manufacturing story is entering a more demanding phase.

The earlier challenge was creating scale in finished products.

The next challenge is building more of the components, materials, engineering knowledge and processes underneath them.

Printed circuit boards offer a clear example of that transition.

The country already has an electronics industry producing more than ?13 lakh crore annually, exports approaching US$48 billion, and a component-manufacturing programme carrying ?69,548 crore in approved investment.

The opportunity now is to translate that scale into deeper manufacturing capability.

For engineers, that means more manufacturing options.

For electronics businesses, it means a broader domestic supplier base.

For PCB manufacturers, it means competing on technology, quality, consistency and engineering—not geography alone.

And for India, it means retaining more of the expertise and value involved in building the electronics that power modern industry.

The ultimate measure of progress will not simply be how many products carry a Made in India label.

It will be how much of what sits inside those products can also be manufactured competitively in India.

Made in India has to go down to the board.

Take Your PCB from Design to Fabrication

Sources/ References:

(1)pib.gov.in

(2)avendus.com

(3) ecms.meity.gov.in