In the financial year 2021-22, Apple and Samsung are set to manufacture smartphones worth over $5 billion (almost Rs 37,000 crore) in India. The two behemoths are on track to outperform the government’s PLI Scheme objectives by more than 50%.
IANS spoke with Pankaj Mohindroo, Chairman of the India Cellular and Electronics Association (ICEA). “The leading global value chains (GVC) firms have got off to a blazing start. Besides Pegatron and Bharat FIH which are now gearing up, the big three — Wistron, Pegatron, and Samsung — will achieve significant production of $5 billion in 2022” he said.
For the first time this year, Apple’s two primary contract manufacturers in India, Foxconn, and Wistron will be eligible for PLI incentives. Pegatron, Apple’s third assembler, is expected to begin manufacturing this year. Samsung, which has its own manufacturing plant in Noida, will take advantage of the scheme’s incentives for the second consecutive year.
Apple and Samsung are already shipping locally manufactured smartphones to the rest of the world in unprecedented numbers. Only iPhone shipments from India have climbed to 5% from 0% a few years ago. Samsung leads in phone exports by a wide margin, with 11.6 million units shipped.
UK, UAE, Germany, Italy, Russia, and South Africa are among the countries to which these companies export from India.
Following the second wave of Covid 19 in India, the government of India announced the Production Linked Incentive Scheme (PLI) for Large Scale Electronics Manufacturing in April 2020. It offers a production-linked incentive to stimulate substantial investments in mobile phone manufacturing and specific electronic components, such as Assembly, Testing, Marking, and Packaging (ATMP) facilities, as well as to boost domestic manufacturing. The Scheme aims to transform the manufacturing and supply chain ecosystem in India, establishing it as a worldwide leader in the industry. India’s involvement and advancement in global value chains have been boosted by the launch of the PLI scheme.
As China recovers from supply chain breakdowns and a trade war with the US, India, as a developing economy, has the ability to fill the market vacuum left by the Chinese. The government is proactively exploring all options for trying to advance in the global technology supply chain. According to certain forecasts, the electronics manufacturing business is predicted to rise by 30% in the next fiscal year, reaching a value of Rs 7 lakh crores. The sector is currently valued at roughly Rs 5.3 lakh crores.
Also, the World Bank estimates that the Modi government’s Production-Linked Incentive (PLI) Scheme would help India’s economy develop at 8.7% in the fiscal year 2022-23, outperforming emerging market rivals such as China.