https://arab.news/44g5h
- Production capacity to be scaled up from 500,000 to million Chromebooks per year
- Partnership expected to boost technology sector, generate employment, PID says
ISLAMABAD: The Pakistan government has signed a letter of understanding (LoU) with a local Google partner and a foreign company to establish a state-of-the-art Chromebook assembly line through a joint venture, the Press Information Department (PID) said on Tuesday.
Pakistan’s IT sector has been performing well in recent years, marking another all-time high record of $310 million in inflows in April.
Central bank data shows the country achieved 62 percent year-on-year growth in the sector. During the 10 months of the current fiscal year (10MFY24), IT exports clocked in at $2.59 billion, up by 21 percent annual basis as compared to $2.14 billion recorded in 10MFY23.
Pakistani IT exports are expected to rise to above $3.5 billion after the government allowed a retention limit from 35 percent to 50 percent in the Exporters’ Specialized Foreign Currency Accounts.
“In a major breakthrough, National Radio Telecom Corporation (NRTC) Pakistan, Allied Australian, and Tech Valley Pakistan signed a letter of understanding (LoU) at the Ministry of Federal Education, paving the way for a groundbreaking joint venture to establish a state-of-the-art Chromebook assembly line in Pakistan,” PID said in a statement on Tuesday.
Tech Valley Pakistan is a social enterprise and the official country partner of Google for Education, Google Workspace and Google Cloud in Pakistan.
The statement said the joint venture was aimed at harnessing the expertise, technology and market insights of each party to establish a world-class assembly line at NRTC and Haripur City in the country’s northwestern Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province after receiving regulatory approvals and infrastructure availability.
PID said the partnership would help boost the country’s technology sector, create new opportunities for economic growth, and generate employment.
“The assembly line will have an initial production capacity of 500,000 Chromebooks per year, which will be scaled up to one million per year,” the statement said, adding that the collaboration had the potential to transform Pakistan into a hub for technology manufacturing and innovation in the region.