Tata Electronics has reached an agreement to acquire a majority stake in Pegatron’s sole iPhone manufacturing facility in India, establishing a new joint venture that bolsters Tata’s role as an Apple supplier.
Under the terms of the deal, Tata will own 60% of the joint venture and will oversee day-to-day operations, according to a Reuters report. Pegatron will retain the remaining stake and continue to provide technical support. The details of the agreement have not been publicly disclosed, the report added.
Business Today was unable to verify the report independently.
In India, iPhone is manufactured by three contract manufacturers: Foxconn, Pegatron Corp, and Tata Group (earlier Wistron Corp). The Pegatron India factory has nearly 10,000 employees and makes 5 million iPhones annually.
Last year, Tata Group had acquired Taiwan’s Wistron plant in Karnataka, and the company is also building another plant in Hosur in Tamil Nadu. For Tata, the Chennai Pegatron plant will bolster its iPhone manufacturing plans.
Apple is trying to diversify its production from China to India due to geopolitical tensions between Beijing and Washington.
Last year, Commerce minister Piyush Goyal said Apple will start 25% of total iPhone production in India by 2023. Apple’s market share in India grew from 4.6% in 2022 to 6.4 percent in 2023, a 38.6 percent increase. Tata has partnered with Apple to launch 100 retail stores for its products across the country.
Apple’s India plans
Apple is accelerating its manufacturing plans in India and Vietnam. Boosted by ease-of-doing-business and local manufacturing policies, Apple’s ‘Make in India’ iPhones are setting new export records.
The company is also planning to open four more branded retail stores in India, as confirmed by CEO Tim Cook.
“We continue to be excited by the enthusiasm we’re seeing in India, where we set an all-time revenue record. This has been an extraordinary year of innovation at Apple,” Cook said during the Q4 fiscal 2024 earnings call. “We can’t wait to bring four new stores to customers in India.”
The tech giant is on track to surpass FY24 export figures from India, reaching over Rs 50,000 crore (more than $6 billion) in the first six months of this fiscal (FY25), according to the latest industry data.
India’s iPhone exports surged to over $10 billion in FY23-24, up from $6.27 billion in FY22-23. In total, Apple’s India operations reached $23.5 billion in value in the last fiscal year.
Apple assembled $14 billion worth of iPhones in India in the last fiscal year and exported over $10 billion worth of devices.