Sunday, June 5 2005 12:39 Hrs (IST) - World Time -

New Delhi: Armed with a letter from the Prime Minister to impress upon the global chips major Intel to set up a facility in India, IT and Telecom Minister Dayanidhi Maran today (Jun 5, 2005) left for the US to press Intel to set up an advanced test manufacturing (ATM) facility in India.

Maran will meet Intel Chairman Craig Barrett and handover a letter from Prime Minister Manmohan Singh regarding setting up of Intel's ATM facility in India and impress upon Intel as to the benefits that would accrue to them in the event of setting up the facility here, an official statement said.

In an effort to promote and project India as a strategic hub for manufacturing, marketing, R&D and services, he will also pitch for major international investments in hardware manufacturing sector from IT behemoths like AMD, Cisco and UT Starcom.

During his visit, Maran will also discuss with IBM, Applied Materials (world's largest Semiconductor Fab Equipment Company) to explore the possibility of setting up of a State-of-the-art 90nm Fab in India. He would also meet with Flextronics, which has made significant investments in off-shore development in India.

The Minister will also have an interactive session and roundtable with leading venture capitalists in the US. He will make a presentation on India's strengths in the telecom and IT sectors with a view to get high quality venture capital investments into the country.