NEW DELHI AP - Apple Inc. will make its latest iPhone 14 in India, the company said on Monday, as manufacturers shift production from China to China amid geopolitical tensions and pandemic restrictions that have disrupted supply chains for many industries.
Apple said in a statement that they are excited to be manufacturing iPhone 14 in India.
Apple AAPL unveiled its latest line-up of iPhones earlier this month. They will have improved cameras, faster processors and longer lasting batteries at the same price as last year s models.
India is the second-largest smartphone market after China, but Apple iPhone sales have struggled to capture a large share of the market against cheaper smartphones from competitors.
Since taking office in 2014, the announcement from the Cupertino, California-based company has coincided with Prime Minister Narendra Modi's push for local manufacturing.
The tech company was founded in India, where it first began manufacturing its iPhone SE in 2017 and has since been able to build a number of iPhone models there. According to local media reports, Apple opened its online store for India two years ago, but the pandemic has delayed plans for a flagship store in India.
The latest model will be shipped by Foxconn 2317, a major iPhone assembler, whose facilities are located on the outskirts of Chennai, a city in southern India.
The analysts believe that nearly a quarter of Apple products will be manufactured outside China by the year 2025, compared to about 5% now. The report said that the relocation efforts that will continue over the next two or three years will likely be triggered by the stringent COVID 19 lockdowns seen in China.
Most of Apple Inc.'s smartphones and tablets are assembled by contractors with factories in China, but the company started asking them in 2020 to look at the possibility of moving some production to Southeast Asia or other places after repeated shutdowns to fight COVID 19 disrupted its global flow of products.
Apple hasn't released details, but news reports say that the company plans to set up assembly of tablet computers and wireless earphones in Vietnam.
Other companies are keeping or expanding manufacturing in China to serve the domestic market, while shifting export-oriented work to other countries due to rising wages and other costs, as well as the difficulty for foreign executives to visit China due to anti-COVID 19 travel restrictions.