Apple to move a quarter of its iPhone production to India in next few years

Apple will shift a quarter of its iPhone production to India in the next two to three years, according to a Wall Street Journal report. That means that more than 50 million iPhones a year will be built in India.

China will remain by far the biggest iPhone producer in the world, but Apple is reportedly looking to diversify its production line with the current tensions between the US and China. The iPhone production in India lagged seriously behind China but that changed with the iPhone 14, which began manufacturing in the same month as in China.

Apple's production efforts in India have been going slowly due to pushback from local unions, which fought against 12-hour shifts. But in 2023, Apple built more iPhone 15 units in India than any other model and it market the first time it managed to release a model made in India on launch day.

Foxconn is currently building a plant in Karnataka state that should open for business in April 2024. WSJ's report points to another major plant in the works.

Source (paywalled)