Hon Hai will start production of iPhone in India in August, with annual production capacity of only one million units

It is understood that Foxconn's iPhone production line in India was officially put into use in August. However, because the preferential export tariffs that Apple hopes to reach with the Indian government have not yet been completed, Foxconn's iPhone production line in India will still focus on domestic sales in the initial stage, and its annual production capacity will only be about 1 million units.

Originally, Apple hoped that Foxconn's iPhone production line in India could take into account the two major demands of export and the Indian domestic market. Therefore, Apple actively negotiated with the Indian government for preferential export tariffs through Foxconn. However, after nearly half a year, the Indian government still did not agree to give Apple satisfactory export tariff preferences, and the Sino-US trade war continued to burn. In the end, Apple decided to ask Foxconn to start the production line first and supply the Indian domestic market first. As for when it can be exported, it can only continue to negotiate.

Industry insiders pointed out that Hon Hai Group's current smartphone production lines in India are still mainly based on the Android system, among which the mainland brand Xiaomi mobile phone is the main product, with an estimated monthly production capacity of 3 million units. Based on this estimate, Apple's iPhone production capacity in one year is almost only Xiaomi's production capacity in 10 days, a gap of 36 times.

However, industry insiders also said that Apple's iPhone requires high assembly precision, and the learning curve for Indian employees is long, so its production capacity progress cannot be compared with that of Android phones.

Foxconn Chairman Liu Yangwei recently pointed out that Foxconn has 25% of its production capacity to support the production of products sold in the United States, and clients are also closely observing changes and will quickly take countermeasures once the situation becomes clear.

Industry insiders said that this does not include Foxconn's iPhone production capacity in India. After all, Apple is an important customer of Foxconn. On the one hand, Foxconn needs to speed up the training of local employees in India. With the current scale of less than 1,000 people, even if Foxconn wants to expand production, it may not be so easy in a short period of time.

On the other hand, Foxconn also needs to speed up export negotiations with the Indian government so that iPhones produced in India can obtain preferential tariffs. In this way, as employee training gradually improves, production capacity is expected to expand, and there will be more room for adjustment in response to the trade war.