A government minister is “confident” that Apple will double or even triple the amount of money it has invested in India in the coming years. It’s expanding iPhone assembly in the subcontinent, and production of other devices there is expected to begin soon.
The comments come a day after Apple CEO Tim Cook met with India’s Prime Minister Narendra Modi.
Apple and India: Partners in production
India’s population of 1.3 billion makes it an enormous potential market, but that’s not the only reason the Mac-maker has its eye on the country. Apple is moving to reduce its dependence on China, which currently assembles most of its products. Apparently, a significant percentage of that production is moving to India.
“I am very confident that this Apple-India partnership has a lot of headroom for investments, growth, exports and jobs — doubling and tripling over coming years,” said Rajeev Chandrasekhar, the deputy minister for information technology, in an interview with Reuters.
While iPhone production has been going on in India for years, initially this was only low-cost models being made for local sale. But now it’s making the newest models in the country and exporting them.
Chandrasekhar predicted that Apple could also double or triple exports from his country in the Reuters interview.
That’s in-line with a separate report that indicated that much as 25% of total iPhone assembly could happen in India by 2025.
And iPhone is apparently only the start. Apple asked its suppliers to move production of AirPods and Beats from China to India. And MacBook and iPad assembly might begin in the country soon, too.
