Apple Makes Nearly 7 Percent Of iPhones In India – Report

The manufacturing move for Apple products to other nations besides China continues, as iPhone production reportedly ramps up in India.

Bloomberg has reported that Apple has trippled iPhone production in India, and now makes almost 7 percent of its iPhones in that country.

It should be noted that Apple had been manufacturing lower-end iPhones in India since 2017, first via Wistron Corp and later by Foxconn – as it worked with the Indian government’s push for local manufacturing.

India production

But Bloomberg on Thursday reported that Apple has significantly increased its production of iPhones in India, accounting for almost 7 percent of its total iPhone production, up from 1 percent in 2021.

The company assembled more than $7 billion worth of iPhones in the country in the last fiscal year, the report said.

The move came as tech manufacturers explored alternative production sources away from China – amid Beijing’s ongoing geopolitical tensions with Western nations, coupled with its strict pandemic restrictions that disrupted supply chains for many industries.

Apple has already moved some of its iPhone manufacturing out of China to other countries, most notably India, where it started manufacturing the iPhone 13 earlier in 2022, and was also considering assembling iPad tablets there as part of its diversification strategy.

Last month it was reported that Apple’s Taiwanese supplier Pegatron Corp, was in talks to open a second iPhone factory near the southern city of Chennai in Tamil Nadu state – just six months after opening its first factory with an investment of $150 million

Pegatron had begun assembling the company’s latest iPhone 14 model in India, last November.

Last month in March 2023, Apple’s principle iPhone maker Foxconn said it will build a new 300-acre facility in Bengaluru, India, to manufacture electronics.

JP Morgan analysts have previously predicted that Apple will move 5 percent of global iPhone 14 production to India by late 2022 and expand its manufacturing capacity in the country to produce 25 percent (one in four) of all iPhones by 2025.

Thailand move?

Meanwhile Apple is not just looking at India to manufacturer its goods.

In August 2022 it was reported that Apple had begun talks with two of its suppliers (Luxshare Precision Industry and Foxconn about manufacturing the Apple Watch and Macbook in Vietnam.

And on Thursday this week Asia Nikkei reported that Apple is in talks with suppliers to make MacBooks in Thailand.

Suppliers who are participating in these talks reportedly have existing manufacturing facilities in Thailand for other clients, and are discussing possible assembly and production of components and modules for MacBooks, sources from three suppliers involved in talks with Apple told Nikkei.

Apple has been mass-producing its Apple Watch in Thailand for more than a year, the report added.