In a major boost to the ‘Make in India’ initiative, Indian Telecom and IT Minister Ashwini Yadav announced that Apple’s largest manufacturing unit is being built in the country. The plant is said to be located in Hosur, around 40 km away from Bengaluru. The Cupertino-based tech giant has been producing the latest models of iPhones in India since 2017. 

The new manufacturing hub for Apple’s iPhones is said to be the biggest in the country. It will reportedly employ 60,000 people in a single factory. The first 6,000 employees are tribal women from areas like Ranchi and Hazaribagh. They have been trained to make the smartphone and will soon be joining the workforce. In September, it was reported that Tata Group could make iPhones for Apple in the country. Recently, they won the contract to manufacture mechanics and the Hosur plant is being set up by Tata Electronics. The company is reportedly in talks with Apple’s Taiwanese supplier to establish a joint venture to assemble iPhones in India. Tata Electronics also aims to hire 85 percent of women in their workforce. 

Currently, Apple has three Taiwanese contract manufacturers in India with Foxconn’s unit located in Tamil Nadu, Pegatron near Chennai, and Wistron in Bengaluru. The development about the biggest Apple manufacturing hub comes after Reuters reported that Foxconn plans to at least quadruple the size of its operations in India over the next two years. Additionally, Foxconn’s largest iPhone manufacturing unit in the world located in Zhengzhou was closed due to the COVID-19 lockdown resulting in to crunch supply, especially of the iPhone 14 Pro variants. 

Previously it was reported that Apple aims to relocate 25 percent of iPhone production to India by 2025. 

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