Taiwanese Apple contract manufacturers to invest $900 million in India: Report

Three Apple contract manufacturers from Taiwan are reportedly planning to invest $900 million in India in the next five years under the Indian government’s $6.65 billion production-linked incentive (PLI) scheme. According to Taiwanese media reports, the vast majority of investment from Foxconn, Wistron, and Pegatron would be focussed on increasing the manufacturing of iPhones in India.

Foxconn, the world's biggest contract electronics maker, has currently two plants in Tamil Nadu and Andhra Pradesh where it assembles Apple and Xiaomi smartphones. The Taiwanese company started the assembly line for the iPhone XR in the country in late 2019 and in July this year, it started production of its flagship iPhone 11 at the Foxconn plant near Chennai. 

PLI scheme

The PLI scheme, aimed at making India an export manufacturing hub, offers cash incentives to companies on an increase in sales of locally-made smartphones. The Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology had announced the scheme to boost large-scale electronics manufacturing as the sector suffers from lack of adequate infrastructure, domestic supply chain and logistics, high cost of finance, inadequate availability of quality power, and inadequacies in skill development.  

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The scheme would extend an incentive of 4 to 6 per cent on incremental sales of goods manufactured in India and covered under target segments for a period of five years subsequent to 2019-20 levels. In the company’s annual general, Foxconn Chairman Liu Young-way had said they were fully pushing ahead with the next steps in India, and maybe in a few months’ time, they will be able to reveal on the next steps on company’s website and report back to everyone. 

In July, reports suggested that Foxconn had planned to invest $1 billion in India amid rising anti-China sentiments due to its expansionist behaviour and handling of coronavirus. Some of the industries and conglomerates across the world have been contemplating on gradually moving out from China to reduce the over-dependence on an authoritarian state. 

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