In June, the Indian government set out a US$6.6bil plan to woo the world’s top smartphone manufacturers, offering financial incentives and ready-to-use manufacturing clusters. Pegatron is now setting up a local subsidiary and joining fellow Taiwanese electronics assemblers Foxconn Technology Group and Wistron Corp, who have already been making some iPhone handsets in southern India.
India has seen a surge of inward investment in recent weeks, with Google, Facebook Inc and others pouring close to US$20bil into Jio Platforms Ltd, billionaire Mukesh Ambani’s mobile Internet venture. Google has committed to spending US$10bil over the next five to seven years to hasten India’s digital transition and Amazon.com Inc has said it intends to export US$10bil of made-in-India goods by 2025.
Smartphones are a focal point for Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s much-touted Make in India programme. Ravi Shankar Prasad, India’s minister for information technology and electronics, has said the goal is for brands and manufacturers to transport the entire supply chain to the country, not just the end-stage assembly. Quoted by local media, Prasad said India wants not only the"bridegroom” but also the"wedding procession”.