By Erick These are the most relevant tech news for Indians from the last seven days, and why each of them matters.
Tech related news from the 2025 Budget
The Finance Minister announced the annual Union Budget yesterday (01-Feb-2025 if you’re reading this in the future) and it has some incentives for the tech sector in India.
In a nutshell:
- Import duties scrapped on smartphone sub-parts, trying to encourage smartphone manufacturing in India
- 10,000 crore boost for investment in startups, emphasising investment in semiconductor manufacturing and tax relief for tech startups
- full exemptions on customs duties for lithium-ion battery waste and critical minerals, aimed at promoting domestic manufacturing and recycling efforts in the EV sector
- Allocations for use of AI in education or something like that.
Why it matters: In essence, the Government wants to encourage more smartphone and EV sector manufacturing in India, and wants you and others to NOT leave India if you have a mind-blowing tech startup business plan. Not entirely sure about AI in education though, I guess it is… whatever.
This fits nicely with my 2025 post-January tech predictions which I wrote and published BEFORE the union budget was announced, check it out.
India’s Generative AI Model Announcement
Union Minister Ashwini Vaishnaw announced that India will launch its own generative AI model within the year. This initiative aims to bolster India’s capabilities in artificial intelligence and enhance its position in the global tech arena.
Why it matters: this announcement nicely coincides with the whole DeepSeek phenomenon (or fiasco if you’re a US Tech Billionaire or investor). I’m not going to go into too much detail about DeepSeek here because I talked about it enough on my IG / X, but I will link a long form article from one of the blogs I follow that has all you need to know about DeepSeek (and also some fantastic memes). Reminder that none of the links in any of my posts are affiliates or sponsored, these are my objective, independent recommendations to my readers.
Read about the announcement here: IndiaToday
Read all about DeepSeek here: DeepSeek: Links and Memes (So Many Memes) – by Trungphan2
Indian News Outlets Take Legal Action Against OpenAI
Speaking of AI (SIGH). Prominent publications such as the Indian Express and Hindustan Times have joined the ongoing legal battle, claiming that OpenAI knowingly uses and stores their material to enhance its AI models.
Why it matters: firstly, hehehe. Secondly, this is not the first time a nation’s news outlets banded together to sue OpenAI – US and Canadian news outlet consortiums have ongoing lawsuits against the same firm. And the news outlets have a very strong case, it’s very obvious OpenAI have used copyrighted information (doesn’t matter if it’s publicly available) to train their models without permission. This is a striking example of US Tech/Government hypocrisy – call out China and India and make tall accusations if they do the same thing, but when it happens in your own backyard with your new president’s poster boy, call it a necessary innovation.
Read: OpenAI CEO Altman to visit India in February for Legal Troubles
Now please let’s step away from AI.
Samsung strike workers register union
Samsung India Workers Union (SIWU) is Samsung’s first workers’ union in India. It is only the second such union in a Samsung plant anywhere in the world.
Why it matters: I consider this a victory for the Indian manufacturing labour force, especially given the support received from the Tamil Nadu Government. It gives hope that the entire tech world can be manufactured in India but not at the cost of worker rights.
Read: Months after indefinite strike, Samsung workers in India register their union
World’s Largest Semiconductor Unit to be in Gujarat
Tata Projects constructing world’s largest back-end semiconductor unit at Sanand in Gujarat. Tata Projects on Tuesday said the construction of the US-based chip company Micron Technology’s semiconductor assembly and test facility at Sanand near Ahmedabad is going on in full swing and may be completed in December 2025.
Why it matters: Taiwan’s global tech dominance was largely its manufacturing of most of the semiconductors in the world – read up on TSMC and the global semiconductor crisis of the last few years (or let me know and I’ll make a post about it). May India exceed this level of dominance. The further benefit I’d like to see from this dominance is – one day – tech gadgets being cheaper for Indian consumers.
Read: Tata Projects constructing world’s largest back-end semiconductor unit at Sanand in Gujarat
Thank you for reading! My name is Erick and I am an Indian Tech blogger and content creator. I talk about more than just new gadgets and software – I talk about tech policy, trends and consumer behaviors that you need to know about and that could be affecting you, so you can make more informed tech related decisions and get more value for your rupees while purchasing tech. I stay out of sponsorships, affiliates or sponsored content so that you can be assured that my reporting is completely independent.
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[…] Opinion: this is great, but let’s not forget about the strikes and protests that happened in 2024 and early 2025. See TWITI #5 of 2025. […]