Karnataka’s Minister for Medical Education and Skill Development Sharan Prakash Patil said on Thursday

India’s next manufacturing leap will come not from assembling more products but from owning the ideas behind them, said Sharan Prakash Patil, Karnataka’s Minister for Medical Education and Skill Development, at the 5th edition of businessline MSME Conclave 2026.

“We should move from ‘made in India’ to ‘designed, engineered and owned in India’,” said Patil, arguing that India’s millions of MSMEs will determine whether the country merely becomes the world’s factory floor or emerges as a global innovation hub.

global manufacturing

The challenge is particularly relevant as India attracts a growing share of global manufacturing. While products such as Apple’s iPhones are increasingly being assembled in the country and electronics companies continue to expand operations as supply chains diversify beyond China, much of the value creation — from product design and patents to core technologies — remains concentrated overseas.

Drawing parallels with Bengaluru’s own evolution, Patil said the city’s success was built decades before the software boom through institutions such as IISc, HAL, BEL, ISRO and DRDO that created a deep scientific and manufacturing ecosystem. “Innovation ecosystems are built over decades,” he said, adding that the next chapter should belong to MSMEs.

He noted that every global capability centre, aerospace company, electronics manufacturer and deep-tech start-up entering Bengaluru depends on an extensive network of suppliers, precision engineering firms and component makers. Strengthening MSMEs, therefore, will strengthen the State’s entire industrial ecosystem.

Patil said entrepreneurs continue to grapple with familiar hurdles, including delayed payments, access to affordable finance, industrial land, rising rentals, urban logistics and regulatory compliance, and argued that removing these bottlenecks could deliver greater gains than introducing fresh subsidies.

He also called for an aggressive push towards AI-led skilling, saying workers — from engineers and technicians to entrepreneurs — must be equipped for an economy increasingly shaped by artificial intelligence, automation and advanced manufacturing. Karnataka, he added, wants AI adoption to extend beyond software into manufacturing, healthcare, agriculture and logistics, while encouraging MSMEs to create products, patents and globally recognised brands, instead of remaining contract manufacturers.

Published on June 25, 2026