…by Athar Shahab, Managing Director at Zuari Industries
In the classroom, chemistry is reassuringly simple. Acids donate protons, bases accept them, and predictable salts are formed. Sulphur burns, transforms into sulphur trioxide, and emerges as sulphuric acid at the end of a neat, balanced equation. The lesson is elegant and universal: if you understand the reaction, you can reproduce the result.
That belief collapses the moment one steps onto a factory floor.
In the real world, the chemical reaction itself is often the least valuable part of the system. What matters is the process. And process is where industrial power resides.
Take sulphuric acid, the “king of chemicals.” Every engineering student knows how it is made. Yet, producing it at an industrial scale requires precise, unforgiving control over temperature, gas purity, catalyst performance, and corrosion management. The chemistry is public domain. The ability to execute it reliably, safely, and economically is not. That capability is built, refined, and fiercely protected over decades.
This is the central truth that India’s manufacturing sector must now confront.
Across modern industry, value has aggressively shifted away from knowing what reacts to knowing how to make it work at scale. Catalysts, reactor designs, operating conditions, and degradation management form the real intellectual property (IP) of the chemical and material world. These are rarely transferred in full. They are licensed, bundled, restricted, and continuously upgraded.
The consequence for India is a deep, structural dependency.
We understand the chemistry. We have a formidable engineering workforce and one of the world’s fastest-growing markets. Yet, we continue to pay for process licenses, import catalysts, and operate within technical frameworks defined elsewhere. The knowledge exists domestically, but the control does not.
The scale of this dependence is staggering. India’s payments for the use of intellectual property run into tens of billions of dollars annually. Catalysts alone represent a billion-dollar-plus domestic market. Behind these numbers lies a stark reality: we are paying recurring rents for capabilities that we are fully capable of developing ourselves.
To be clear, this is not a critique of global trade. IP systems are legitimate and necessary. The issue is our strategic posture. No major industrial power has built itself by remaining a perpetual licensee.
However, the default to licensing is rarely due to a lack of ambition among Indian industrialists; it is driven by the brutal economics of risk. Building a First-of-a-Kind (FOAK) industrial plant using an unproven domestic process carries massive financial exposure. For a corporate board, paying for a proven European or American license is a necessary de-risking strategy to guarantee yield.
Breaking this cycle requires a fundamental shift in national priorities, backed by a framework that underwrites this risk.
First, we must exercise strategic selectivity. India cannot, and should not, attempt to reinvent the wheel on legacy petrochemical processes where global incumbents have a century-long head start. Instead, our intent must be directed at the next generation of industry. As the world navigates the energy transition, owning the process technologies for advanced bio-based fuels, green hydrogen electrolysis, battery precursor refining, and next-generation energy molecules is where the real strategic leap lies.
Second, we must bridge the “missing middle.” We have invested in laboratory chemistry, but we must now invest in scale-up. Pilot plants, demonstration facilities, and industrial testbeds are the weakest links in our innovation ecosystem. Too many ideas remain confined to beakers because the infrastructure to translate them into continuous operating processes is inadequate. International models offer clear blueprints: Germany’s Fraunhofer institutes and the Netherlands’ TNO operate as public-private engines specifically designed to move ideas from concept to commercial reality. India urgently needs its own version of this architecture.
Third, process capability requires “patient capital.” Traditional financing mechanisms in India are often geared toward software-like returns – quick scaling with low capital expenditure. Process engineering is fundamentally different. It is capital-intensive and requires longer gestation periods. Government policy and institutional financing must align to support early-stage scale-up and FOAK deployments, where the technical and financial risks are at their peak.
Finally, catalysis must become a national mission. Catalysts determine yields, energy efficiency, and environmental performance. Control over catalysts translates directly into control over the process itself. Developing indigenous catalyst technologies is not optional; it is foundational to industrial autonomy.
None of this will be easy. Building process capability demands patience in a system that habitually seeks quick returns.
But the alternative is clear. A continued reliance on imported processes will lock India into a cycle where value is consistently transferred outward. In a world where supply chains are increasingly weaponised and technological control is a geopolitical tool, being a perpetual tenant is a vulnerable position.
High-school chemistry teaches us that reactions are universal. Industrial reality teaches us that outcomes are not. India stands at an inflection point. The talent exists. The market exists. We must decide whether we will remain mere participants in processes designed elsewhere, or become the creators of our own industrial future.
We cannot continue to rent the future. We must build it.
