iPhone maker Foxconn buys huge site in India tech hub

Taiwanese electronics giant Foxconn has bought a huge tract of land on the outskirts of Indian tech hub Bengaluru, the key Apple supplier said in a filing Tuesday as it looks to diversify production away from China.

Also known by its official name, Hon Hai Precision Industry, Foxconn is the world's biggest contract electronics manufacturer and a principal assembler of Apple iPhones.

Both companies are seeking to diversify away from China, where much of their manufacturing is based, after strict Covid policies in recent years and ongoing diplomatic tensions with the US hurt production.

The 1.2 million-square-metre (13 million-square-foot) acquisition in Devanahalli, near the airport for Indian tech hub Bengaluru, was announced in a statement to the London Stock Exchange.

Its subsidiary Foxconn Hon Hai Technology India Mega Development was paying US$37 million (about RM164 million) for the site, it said.

Another Foxconn unit was acquiring land use rights to a 480,000-square-metre site in Vietnam's Nghe An province, it added.

Karnataka state chief minister Basavaraj S Bommai said in March that Apple would "soon" manufacture iPhones at a new plant in the state, creating "about 100,000 jobs".

Bloomberg News reported that month that Foxconn was planning to invest US$700 million in a new factory in Karnataka the same month, citing unnamed sources.

Foxconn chairman Young Liu visited the state then to "deepen partnerships... and seek cooperation in new areas such as semiconductor development and electric vehicles", he said in a statement.

He also met with Prime Minister Narendra Modi, who said the pair's "discussions covered various topics aimed at enhancing India's tech and innovation eco-system".

Foxconn has manufactured Apple handsets in India since 2019 at its plant in the southern state of Tamil Nadu.

Two other Taiwanese suppliers, Wistron and Pegatron, also manufacture and assemble Apple devices in India.

Apple has been making its own push into India and chief executive Tim Cook last month opened its first two retail stores in the world's most populous country.

The California-based firm is betting big on the nation of 1.4 billion people – home to the second-highest number of smartphone users in the world, after China.

The world's biggest company in terms of market value is also expanding its manufacturing footprint in India.

Apple said last September it would manufacture its latest iPhone 14 in India, just weeks after launching the flagship model.

The country last year accounted for seven percent of Apple's iPhone production, according to Bloomberg, lagging behind the US, China, Japan and other countries.

Apple's expanding manufacturing in India is a boost to Modi's "Make in India" strategy, under which he has urged foreign businesses to manufacture goods in the South Asian nation.