Industry body India Electronics & Semiconductor Association (IESA) says that Indian electronics industry is ready to fulfill components wish list of Apple for making iPhone in India if Apple provides purchase commitment to local firms.
“If government says fall in line, industry associations are prepared to enter into agreement with Apple and say tell us what your wish list is, we will fulfil it in next 3, 6, 9 and 12 months,” IESA President MN Vidyashankar told DNA. Apple has submitted proposal for setting up single brand retail stores in the country but has sought exemption from the local sourcing norms as the US-based giant makes state-of-the-art and cutting edge technology products for which local sourcing is not possible.
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Finance Minister, Arun Jaitely has rejected relaxing the 30 per cent domestic sourcing norms, as sought by iPhone and iPad maker as a pre-condition for bringing in FDI to set up single-brand retail stores in the country.
The Ministry of Commerce has taken a line that the 30 per cent local sourcing requirement can be waived off for high-end technology products and will again try for exempting Apple from this norm Vidyashankar said.
“If someone is heading an organization who has 200 companies and now these 200 companies are given an order with assurance that components will be sourced from them for next three years. It can be easily done …that’s what we are looking at,” Vidyashankar said.
“We need not start with semiconductors. There are hundreds of item where we can satisfy. Out of over 2,000 items required in an iPhone, we can start with 200. Starting from packaging, PCBs, battery to what not but as I said it will take some time,” Vidyashankar said. Apple’s products are made Taiwanese electronics manufacturing giant Foxconn in China. Foxconn has set up its manufacturing unit in India but it is engaged in making mobile phones of mostly China-based companies here.
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