Takshashila Issue Brief - The Quad Agenda for Semiconductors, Biotechnology, and Space

Last week, Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi participated in the third Quad Leaders’ Summit in Hiroshima, Japan, along with leaders from Australia, Japan, and the United States. They discussed the Indo-Pacific region, reaffirming their commitment to shared democratic values and strategic interests. They announced several regional resilience, prosperity, and development initiatives, including a clean energy supply chain initiative, a Quad infrastructure fellowships programme, and a partnership for undersea cable connectivity and resilience in the Indo-Pacific.

India will host the next Quad Summit in 2024. Since its regrouping, the Quad has set an ambitious agenda and the partners have demonstrated commitment to using the platform for realising a shared vision of the Indo-Pacfic — free, open, inclusive, and resilient. While the Indo-Pacific Partnership for Maritime Domain Awareness provides the immediate maritime governance and security agenda for the Quad, the grouping must diversify its focus to other areas as well.

We have argued that the “convergence of values and geopolitical interests means Quad countries are uniquely placed to envelop their economies inside bubbles of trust”. An economic agenda for Quad is critical to bolstering its security and geopolitical interests. The Quad has already established working groups such as the Critical and Emerging Technology working group, which has identified areas such as semiconductors, biotechnology, 5G communication, space, and cybersecurity, for collaboration.  

In this Issue Brief, we take a look at some of the area-specific recommendations for the Quad, arising from our work, which can not only achieve Quad’s objectives but also help usher in a freer global economic order.

Semiconductors

Given their unique global supply chain, multilateralism is not a choice but a necessity for semiconductors. We have argued that the Quad Semiconductor Supply Chain Initiative “suggests a shift in mindset from national self-sufficiency to multilateral strategic cooperation”. 

In Siliconpolitik: The Case for a Quad Semiconductor Partnership, we argued that the Quad collaboration on semiconductors must rest on the following principles, which give rise to specific recommendations:

1. Think security and ecosystem, not indigenisation and manufacturing: Quad can set up a consortium aimed at building a diversified semiconductor manufacturing base and cooperate on developing new standards such as RISC-V and GaN manufacturing [1].

2. Coalesce “bubbles of trust”: The Quad must aim to form a larger bubble of semiconductor manufacturing involving Taiwan and South Korea and another one on semiconductor R&D and design with the EU and Taiwan.

3. Governments should do what companies can’t or won’t: The Quad must encourage strategic cooperation on R&D between private companies in respective countries. Agreements on tech transfers, licensing, and cross-licensing within the ‘bubble’, backed by strong patent and legal enforcement regimes must be enabled.

Biotech & Biomanufacturing

For the biotech sector, in the Takshashila Issue Paper - The Case for Quad Co-operation in Biotechnology we identified the following areas for potential collaboration between the countries: Pandemic Research Hub, Sustainable Agriculture and Animal Husbandry, Vaccines, Gene Editing, Synthetic Biology, and Computational Biology.

In the more recent Takshashila Discussion Document – The Quad should Commit to a Bio-hub in India we propose setting up a bio-manufacturing hub in India, promoted by the Quad. Biotech is an emerging technology with significant economic potential in areas like foods, pharmaceuticals, oil, plastics, and more. Given its military applications, it also enjoys strategic value. 

The ‘hub’ will focus on the following areas to enable coordination and collaboration between the biotech sectors of the Quad:

1. Strengthening the physical infrastructure

2. Strengthening workforce capabilities

3. Increasing visibility of available opportunities for funding or collaboration 

Space Sector

We first proposed the idea of a Quad space station in the Takshashila Discussion Document — Examining the Opportunities and Challenges for India’s Human Spaceflight Programme. 

The analysis yields that India has immense potential for collaboration with Japan as a symmetric partner, and with Australia as a junior partner, for achieving its human spaceflight goals. While the scope is limited with respect to the U.S. due to differing space priorities, India can still benefit from working with the private space sector in the U.S. for building a space station. India could look to bolster its Gaganyan programme [2] by identifying options for international cooperation available within the Quad.

This Issue Brief was compiled by Shrikrishna Upadhyaya.

Further Material:

1. A ‘bubbles of trust’ approach - The Hindu by Nitin Pai

2. Siliconpolitik: The Case for a Quad Semiconductor Partnership — The Takshashila Institution by Pranay Kotasthane

3. The Quad Makes the First Siliconpolitik Move – NUS Institute of South Asian Studies (ISAS) by Pranay Kotasthane

4. 3 ideas for 4 countries hunting for chips: What the Quad must do to build a resilient semiconductor chain by Pranay Kotasthane, Glenn Downey and Stephen Ezell

5. The next step for Quad: A dialogue on high tech - Hindustan Times by Pranay Kotasthane and Rohan Seth

6. A road map for Quad’s emerging technology working group - Hindustan Times by Arjun Gargeyas

7. Takshashila Issue Paper - The Case for Quad Co-operation in Biotechnology by Arjun Gargeyas, Ruturaj Gowaikar & Shambhavi Naik

8. Takshashila Discussion Document – The Quad should Commit to a Bio-hub in India by Shambhavi Naik, Dirk van der Kley, Saurabh Todi, Daniel Pavlich

9. Takshashila Discussion Document - Examining the Opportunities and Challenges for India’s Human Spaceflight Programme by Pranav R Satyanath

10. Could the Quad Help With India’s Space Station Dreams? – The Diplomat by Pranav R Satyanath

11. Quad Needs a More Near-Term, Outcomes-Focussed Approach by Manoj Kewalramani

12. India dives into Quad waters | Deccan Herald by Lt. Gen. Prakash Menon

[1] RISC-V is an open-standard instruction set architecture, which is open source and customisable. GaN stands for Gallium Nitrite, a semiconductor composite.

[2] Gaganyaan programme aims to demonstrate India’s human spaceflight capability by launching a crewed mission to space and bringing them back to Earth safely.