Ghulam Ishaq Khan Institute has successfully conducted the nationwide INSPIRE entrance test for the fully funded Up-Skilling Training Program under the Prime Minister’s INSPIRE initiative, part of the broader National Semiconductor Development Plan. The test was held simultaneously across eight cities including Islamabad, Rawalpindi, Abbottabad, Swabi, Lahore, Mianwali, Multan, and Karachi, reflecting a deliberate effort to ensure geographic inclusivity in identifying talent from across Pakistan rather than concentrating selection in a handful of major urban centres.
The entrance test drew significant interest from across the country’s academic and professional community, with over 3,600 applications received from candidates representing more than 180 cities and 200 universities nationwide. From this pool, 1,700 candidates were shortlisted to sit the test across the eight test centres, with the breadth of university representation indicating that the programme has reached well beyond the established technology institutions in Lahore, Islamabad, and Karachi to attract applicants from a much wider cross-section of Pakistan’s higher education landscape.
The INSPIRE initiative, supported by the Ministry of Information Technology and Telecommunications and Pakistan Software Export Board under the PM SkillTech Initiative and Tech Destination Pakistan platform, aims to build Pakistan’s capacity in semiconductor design and advanced chip technologies through a four-month industry-oriented training programme. Semiconductors have emerged as one of the most strategically significant technology domains globally, with major economies investing heavily in domestic chip design and manufacturing capacity following supply chain disruptions that exposed the risks of concentrated production. Pakistan’s National Semiconductor Development Plan represents an effort to position the country as a contributor to this global value chain rather than a passive consumer, by building a trained pool of engineers capable of working in chip design, verification, and embedded systems development. The successful nationwide rollout of the INSPIRE entrance test marks an important early milestone in translating that ambition into a structured, scalable talent development programme.
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