India

A new report suggests that we’ve reached a turning point for Apple in India, as the company appears to have earned more smartphone revenue in the country than any other brand.

This is indeed quite a turnaround in just a few years. The company’s market share in 2018 was said to have been as low as 1% …

Update: As reported by Reuters, Foxconn India’s iPhone plant restarted production this Wednesday after three weeks closed. The publication notes that the factory reopened with one shift and 120 workers. Foxconn will take over two months for the plant to produce at full capacity again.

Late last year, 9to5Mac reported that Apple had ordered Foxconn in India to suspend iPhone production at a plant while placing the company on probation until it resolved problems with living conditions in Foxconn’s dormitories. Now, it appears the iPhone plant will reopen.

We’re today learning more about what prompted the Foxconn iPhone plant shutdown in southern India – and it makes for truly gruesome reading.

We learned yesterday that Apple ordered Foxconn to suspend production at the plant, and placed the company on probation, until it resolved problems with living conditions in the company dormitories. It’s only today, however, that we’re getting the full picture of just how appalling those conditions were …

iPhone production in India has again been disrupted as a result of worker complaints. Assembly was suspended at a Wistron plant last year following a riot over underpaid wages, and production has now been halted at a Foxconn plant after Apple upheld complaints about worker accommodation.

It is common in both India and China for seasonal iPhone workers to be recruited from considerable distances, and to live in company-supplied dormitories for the duration of their contract …

Analysts expect iPhone sales in India to grow by more than 50% year-on-year, up from under $2B in Apple’s 2019/2020 financial year to around $3B by the end of the current financial year.

iPhone production in India has also increased dramatically since 2017 …

The first physical Indian Apple Store, due to open later this year, has been delayed due to COVID-19, the company has confirmed. The country was very badly hit by the pandemic, with more than 30 million cases and over 400,000 deaths.

Apple has already had to wait many years to get the go-ahead to open its first retail store, due to legal requirements laid down by the government …

A month ago, Apple released Lossless and Dolby Atmos with Spatial Audio support for Apple Music subscribers on iOS 14.6. The problem was that subscribers in India couldn’t find the option. This is changing now, as Apple had promised would be the case.

Two Apple suppliers in India have been selected to receive manufacturing incentives, which are likely to be used for iPad production in the country. The scheme is known as a production-linked incentive (PLI) plan.

Foxconn and Wistron were among the companies to qualify for cash-back deals in return for boosting their manufacturing operations in the country …

Mac sales in India more than tripled year-on-year after Apple was finally allowed to open an online store in the country.

That made Apple the fifth-largest PC brand in the country as of the first quarter of 2021 …

Apple is trying to diversify its supply chain partners apart from only China. The company is focusing its plans on India as well. According to DigiTimes, Apple has reportedly created around 20,000 job opportunities in the country since last year. If it wasn’t for the pandemic, the numbers could be even higher.

A COVID-hit Foxconn plant in India has resulted in iPhone production being halved at the facility, as the country struggles to cope with a severe spread of the infection. The country is now the worst-hit in the world in terms of fatalities, having overtaken Brazil last month on a rolling average basis.

More than 100 Foxconn employees at the plant have tested positive, and no staff are allowed to enter the facility until late May …

We will see different countries around the world battle for Apple’s business throughout the 2020s, suggests a respected analyst, as the Cupertino company continues its efforts to reduce its manufacturing dependence on China.

The report notes that we currently see four variations of the familiar “Designed by Apple in California, Assembled in China” label…

Three months after an employee riot brought assembly lines to a halt, Wistron has resumed iPhone production in India.

However, both the company and government appear wary of any repetition of the unrest caused by underpaid wages. It took two months for Wistron to announce that it was restarting production, and a further month to actually do so, and that is so far on a limited scale …

A report says that iPhone 12 production will start in India soon, with Foxconn assembling models for both domestic sale and export. Up to 10% of production is said to be moving to India from China, with Pegatron also set to begin iPhone assembly in the country later in the year.

The Foxconn plant named in the report currently makes the iPhone 11 and iPhone XR …

The possibility of iPad production in India got a step closer today, as the government approved a proposal to offer a billion dollars’ worth of incentives. The production-linked incentive (PLI) plan is specifically aimed at manufacturing tablets and computing equipment.

A previous report said that Apple was interested in using the incentives to begin iPad assembly there…

Apple is reportedly in discussions about starting iPad assembly in India, alongside the iPhones it already makes there.

The Cupertino company had previously succeeded in lobbying the government for financial incentives for setting up and then boosting iPhone assembly in the country, and new incentives are now being offered for local assembly of tablets and laptops…

A neat new Apple Watch challenge is starting today in India and it looks to be one of the biggest we’ve seen to date. “Get Active India” is more than just a personal challenge with its goal of finding out which city in the country is the fittest.

Wistron iPhone production is restarting in India almost two months after an employee riot caused millions of dollars’ worth of damage to the plant.

That isn’t the end of the matter, however, with Apple stating that the supplier is still on probation …

Apple will officially announce the fiscal results of Q1 2021 tomorrow, but research firms Counterpoint and CyberMedia came out ahead and revealed some details about how the company performed in India during the last quarter. The research reveals that Apple succeeded in doubling its market share in the country thanks to the growth in iPhone sales there.