Critics have long dismissed Indian manufacturing as "screwdriver technology": import the parts, put them together, and call it made in India.
On Saturday, 14 November, Shri Ashwini Vaishnaw, Union Minister for Electronics and Information Technology, Railways, and Information and Broadcasting, visited Ethereal Machines' Factory 1 in Bengaluru. Afterwards, he gave those critics his answer: precision CNC machines, designed in India and made in India.
He didn't stay at the end of the aisle
Official visits often stop at a welcome speech and a photograph. This one went onto the floor.
The Minister leaned in at the doors of a running machine to watch the cutter work. He picked up finished parts and turned them over in his hands. He stood at the control panels while our engineers explained what each machine was doing, and why every one of them was designed and built by Ethereal.
We walked him through the three things we believe India has to own:
- The machine. Multi-axis CNC machines we design, build and run ourselves, holding tolerances to ±0.005 mm.
- The software. Vesper, our AI platform, which turns a customer's drawing into a planned, checked process on the floor.
- The brain. The CNC controller our engineers are building. It is the part of a machine tool that India has long bought from abroad.
Things that go into things
Afterwards, he spoke to the press about why this matters for India's semiconductor plans. A chip plant runs on machines. Those machines are built from parts cut to extraordinarily fine limits. And for decades, India bought those parts from a handful of countries.
"For developing the semiconductor ecosystem, we want semiconductor manufacturing machines to be manufactured in India, and they require extremely high-precision components. This factory here builds the machines as well as the components which can be used in semiconductor manufacturing machines … Normally, such components were manufactured in countries like Germany and Japan … our reliance on imports will reduce."
Shri Ashwini Vaishnaw, speaking to ANI at Factory 1
That evening he put it in one line on his own channel. India, he said, is now "manufacturing things that go into things that go into things."
It's the best description of our work we've heard. A phone needs a chip. The chip needs a fab. The fab needs machines. Those machines need precision parts. And precision parts need machines like ours.
The day the country noticed
That afternoon, ANI and PTI were carrying the Minister's words. By night, the footage had run on DD News, CNN-News18, Republic and Zee Business, on All India Radio in Hindi and Kannada, and on TV9 Kannada. By the next morning it had been written up by The Economic Times, Business Standard, Deccan Herald and The Tribune.
In all, more than 80 news outlets and public accounts picked up the story, and the posts we tracked passed 1.5 lakh views in the first day. The Press Information Bureau summed up the visit in the Minister's words:
"Ethereal Machines facility is playing an important role in this direction by producing advanced machinery and high-precision components."
Shri Ashwini Vaishnaw, via PIB Bengaluru
The reply we liked best came from a reader on X: "Everyone counts fabs. I count machine tools."
Built here
We started Ethereal Machines on one belief, and the visit put it in front of the whole country. For India to lead in manufacturing, the machine and the software that drives it both have to be built here.
"Absolute honour and a pleasure to host Hon. Minister Ashwini Vaishnaw ji today and run him through all the industrialisation heavy lifting being done at Ethereal Machines' Factory 1."
Kaushik Mudda, Co-founder and CEO, Ethereal Machines
We thank the Hon. Minister for his time on the floor and for his support throughout our journey. We also thank every newsroom that carried the story.
Where to watch and read
Each mark below opens that outlet's own coverage.
16 outlets · English, Hindi, Kannada
If you need precision parts built in India, send us your drawing. We'll show you how our machines would make it.
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- make in india
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