VOI World/ Shambhavi Shree
India’s Commerce and Industry Minister Piyush Goyal urged the country’s auto component manufacturers to expand their businesses globally, particularly in developed markets, and highlighted opportunities for greater US-India investment and supply chain cooperation. Meanwhile, US Ambassador to India Sergio Gor described the India-US bilateral partnership as being at a “historic high point” at the 66th Annual Session of the Automotive Component Manufacturers Association (ACMA) in New Delhi.
Addressing the event, US Ambassador Sergio Gor highlighted the deepening US-India cooperation in the automotive sector, where the two countries are “co-designing the future of mobility together”. He described India’s auto component industry as a reliable partner in strengthening supply chain resilience. Noting the presence of US companies in India’s automotive ecosystem and Indian companies in the United States, he invited Indian auto component manufacturers to explore investments in the US through greenfield assembly, R&D centres and distribution networks.
His pitch for greater Indian investment in the US was met with an equally outward-looking message from Goyal. The Commerce Minister urged Indian auto component manufacturers to transform local businesses into global businesses, expand manufacturing footprints across developed countries, strengthen supply chain resilience and move up the value chain as India seeks to deepen its integration with global markets. He also called upon the industry to focus on safety, make greater use of artificial intelligence for better quality control and make vehicle scrappage more financially attractive for new vehicle buyers.
Goyal also sought to encourage greater US investment in India, offering US companies dedicated industrial infrastructure. He mentioned that the government was developing a network of new industrial smart cities with plug-and-play infrastructure and suggested that some of these could be developed and tailored specifically for US-India partnerships, including dedicated parks for auto component manufacturing.
The Commerce Minister’s call for Indian companies to expand globally comes against the backdrop of India’s broader push to secure greater access to developed markets. He highlighted India’s growing market access through nine trade agreements covering 38 countries, giving Indian businesses access to economies with a combined GDP of around $60 trillion.
Elaborating on this, he mentioned that India would soon have FTAs with the GCC and Israel once the situation stabilised there, along with other FTAs around the world to secure greater access to critical minerals needed for resilient supply chains. On critical minerals, the Commerce Minister noted that the United States and India were working together as partners.
Giving further insight into the broader India-US relationship, the US Ambassador outlined US-India cooperation across pharmaceuticals, military sales and exercises, IT, data centres and space. He emphasised the Pax Silica Declaration as a landmark step towards a pro-innovation regulatory framework and mentioned that India was among the first countries invited to join.
He also informed that both sides were working towards a fair, reciprocal and mutually beneficial trade relationship and highlighted the progress made, including a recent trade understanding between the two countries. Further, he confirmed that Commerce Minister Piyush Goyal was expected to travel to the United States later this month for G20 talks.
He also said the US Embassy in India ranked first among US embassies globally, facilitating $24 billion in new investment into the United States.
The remarks by the Indian Minister and the US Ambassador suggest that the next phase of India-US economic engagement could increasingly involve investment and production on both sides, rather than being centred primarily on Indian exports to the American market. Greater two-way investment, joint manufacturing, technology partnerships, cooperation in electric vehicles and other advanced automotive technologies, along with critical minerals and supply chain resilience, could become a larger part of the bilateral economic relationship.
The broader direction is clear: India and the US are moving towards deeper economic integration, with companies looking beyond trade to invest, manufacture and build supply chain linkages across both markets.
