Foxconn, Apple's main supplier, has acquired a 1.2 million square meter plot of land in Devanahalli, near Bangalore Airport, now considered India's Silicon Valley, the Taiwanese tech giant said in a stock exchange filing Tuesday. This is proof that the industrial group is looking to diversify its production outside China.
Its subsidiary Foxconn Hon Hai Technology India Mega Development bought the site for 3 billion rupees (33.55 million euros). The group also said in the same document that another Foxconn unit was in the process of acquiring the rights to use a 480,000-square-meter plot of land in Vietnam's Nghe An province.
Who is Foxconn, the controversial subcontractor that manufactures Apple's iPhones in China?
Towards a relocation outside China?
Officially known as Hon Hai Precision Industry, Foxconn is the world's largest manufacturer of contract electronics and the main assembler of iPhones. The giant has been manufacturing Apple devices in India since 2019, in a factory located in the southern state of Tamil Nadu.
Both companies are looking to diversify their operations away from China, where most of their production is located, given strict Covid policies last year and ongoing diplomatic tensions with the U.S. that have hurt production.
Karnataka Chief Minister Basavaraj S. Bommai announced in March that Apple would "soon" manufacture iPhones at a new factory in the state, and create "about 100,000 jobs." That same month, Bloomberg News reported, citing anonymous sources, that Foxconn planned to invest $700 million in a new plant in Karnataka.
In a statement from the group in March, Young Liu, chairman of Foxconn, had visited the state to "deepen partnerships (...) and seek cooperation in new areas such as semiconductor development and electric vehicles." He also met with Prime Minister Narendra Modi, who said the "discussions focused on various topics aimed at strengthening India's technology and innovation ecosystem."
Two other Taiwanese groups, Wistron and Pegatron, manufacture and assemble devices of the American brand in India. And this, in a context where Apple announced last September that it would manufacture its latest model, the iPhone 14, in India.
