Manufacture in India, build for the world: Sitharaman urges global investors

Washington: Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman invited global investors to set up manufacturing bases, and technology and innovation centres in India, urging them to leverage talent and opportunity to build for the world.

Addressing a high-level Business Roundtable with leading investors and business leaders in Chicago on Friday, Sitharaman highlighted India's broad-based growth, reform momentum and expanding opportunities for long-term investment.

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Sitharaman emphasised that India's investment proposition rests not on any single sector, but on the convergence of scale, growth, talent, infrastructure, technology and sustained reform over the past decade.

"The policy environment is increasingly focused on enabling businesses to invest, manufacture, innovate and expand," she said at the roundtable organised by India's Consulate General in Chicago in association with US-India Strategic Partnership Forum.

The Finance Minister invited global partners to co-develop, co-produce and build for global markets.

She urged them not to consider India merely as a market to serve, but as a platform from which to build for the world -- whether as a manufacturing base, technology and innovation centre, consumer market or destination for long-term infrastructure investment -- leveraging India's engineering talent, manufacturing scale and technology ecosystem.

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The focus of the meeting was "Manufacture in India - for India and for the world", with opportunities across manufacturing, AI & digital, financial services, infrastructure, food processing, defence and advanced technologies.

"As global companies reassess supply chains and capital allocation, India offers not only scale as a market, but increasing depth as a long-term investment and operating platform," Sitharaman said.

The minister said India's Digital Public Infrastructure such as Aadhaar, UPI, DigiLocker, ONDC and India Stack, has created platforms at population scale.

"The next opportunity is to build higher-value businesses in AI, engineering, analytics, product development, semiconductors and electronics, with India's Global Capability Centres increasingly becoming global innovation hubs," she said.

Sitharaman said GIFT City was emerging as an international financial centre connecting global capital with Indian opportunities.

With 1,250 registered entities as of June 2026, it offers opportunities across banking, fund management, reinsurance, aircraft and ship leasing, sustainable finance and other cross-border services, Sitharaman said, inviting global institutions to explore GIFT City as a gateway to India's financial ecosystem.

She said with global supply chains being reconfigured, India offers a compelling combination of a large domestic market and globally competitive manufacturing capabilities.

The focus is moving beyond assembly towards deeper component manufacturing, engineering and advanced technologies, supported by targeted policy measures including production-linked incentives, the minister said.

Sitharaman said India's infrastructure build-out - from dedicated freight corridors and railway modernisation to electrification and high-speed rail - offers opportunities across engineering, technology, materials, specialised equipment and long-term institutional capital.

She said the National Investment and Infrastructure Fund provides a commercially driven platform for global investors to participate in this opportunity.

Sitharaman said India's agricultural base, rising incomes and changing consumption patterns are creating opportunities across food processing, automation, packaging, logistics and cold chains, with potential to build businesses serving both Indian and global markets.

The Finance Minister said through initiatives such as Atmanirbhar Bharat and iDEX, India is building domestic capabilities in drones, autonomous systems and other advanced technologies.

Sitharaman is on a six-day visit to the US and is scheduled to attend the G-20 Finance Ministers' meeting in Asheville in North Carolina and visit New York.