Apple's Partners and Samsung Participate in India's Production-Linked Incentive Scheme

Published by Ushna Arif Sunday, August 2, 2020

A total of 22 companies including tech companies like Samsung, Apple's manufacturing partners Foxconn, Wistron and Pegatron, and Indian smartphone vendors Micromax and Lava have applied for India's incentive program worth $6.6 billion whose aim is to boost local smartphone manufacturing. 

The scheme is called Production-Linked Incentive Scheme and offers a range of incentives to companies including a financial incentive of 6% on additional sales of locally manufactured products over a period of 5 years, with 2019-2020 as the base year. 

The companies that have applied for the program have agreed to export 60% of their goods produced locally outside of India, according to India’s IT Minister, Ravi Shankar Prasad. He further added that the companies have estimated to produce smartphones and components worth $153 billion during the given 5 years time. 

A total of 22 companies have filed their application under the PLI Scheme. These companies will produce mobile phones and components worth Rs 11.5 lakh crore in the coming 5 years out of which products worth Rs 7 lakh crore will be exported. pic.twitter.com/3yUky3HkOC

— Ravi Shankar Prasad (@rsprasad) August 1, 2020

 

The goal of the Production-Linked Incentive Scheme is to make India a global hub of high-quality manufacturing of smartphones and support the Indian Prime Minister, Narendra Modi's vision to make the country self-reliant. Moreover, the companies have also agreed to offer both direct and indirect employment to roughly 1.2 million people in India.

Among the companies that have applied for the incentive scheme, two giant companies, Apple and Samsung, will serve as a source of great opportunities in India. The Indian Minister welcomed both the companies in his press conference statement, encouraging them to expand their presence in India. The participation of Apple's manufacturing partners is also indicative of the company's future plans for local production in India. 

Some major companies like Oppo, Vivo, and OnePlus, however, were missing from the list of companies that the Minister mentioned. He did state, though, that the government did not prevent companies from any country from participating in the program. 

The Indian Minister further expressed his optimism and said that they were looking forward to building a strong ecosystem across the value chain and integrating with the global value chains, and as a result, strengthening the ecosystem of electronics manufacturing in India.

The deadline for participating in the Indian incentive program was Friday of this week, while the program was initiated in April.