Indian prime minister will meet with Tim Cook during U.S. visit

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Modi takes a selfie with Chinese President Xi Jinping, who will also be touring the U.S. soon.
Photo: Gizbot

Indian Prime Minister and noted iPhone user Narendra Modi has requested to meet Tim Cook during his upcoming visit to the U.S. — reportedly to discuss the possibility of Apple investing in R&D and manufacturing in his country.

Modi arrives in New York on September 24 and 25, before heading to the West Coast on September 26 and 27.

 

As well as Tim Cook, Modi will meet Mark Zuckerberg at Facebook headquarters, as well as Google CEO Sundar Pichai and Tesla Motor’s Elon Musk.

India represents a clear market opportunity for Apple. With 1.2 billion citizens and a fast-growing smartphone market, it is viewable as the next China, and a market for Apple to focus on to continue growing its iPhone business.

Although Apple’s market share in India is still well below that of manufacturers Samsung, Micromax and Karbonn, there have been inroads made. Last year, the first shipment of iPhone 6 handsets to India sold out in a lightning-fast 72 hours. Between October 2013 and September 2014, the country additionally sold 1 million iPhones, marking a new sales record.

Apple has even proven willing to take a profit margin hit to get the devices into more people’s hands — halving the credit period given to retailers and lowering its sales margin by 0.5 to 1%.

This April, Apple’s regulatory head for Europe, Middle East, India and Africa met with India’s Communications and I.T. Minister Ravi Shankar Prasad to listen to a proposal that would see Apple open an R&D center in the country. This would benefit India because it would legitimize the country’s currently-booming tech industry much as Apple’s R&D facility in Israel does for that country.

There has also been talk of Apple’s regular manufacturer Foxconn building iPhones in India, since this would allow Foxconn to get around the problem of accelerating wage inflation in China, where the majority of iPhones are made at the moment.

Tim Cook may additionally be among the CEOs given an audience with Chinese President Xi Jinping, who will also be visiting the U.S. at the same time as Modi.

Who knows, maybe the three of them can get together for another record-breaking iPhone selfie?

Source: Rapidnewsnetwork

 

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