The Indian government’s ‘Make in India’ initiative appears to have sparked a lot of interest among smartphone manufacturers. Joining big names such as Foxconn and Wistron will be Shenzhen-based Huawei.
The company announced today that it will start manufacturing smartphones in India from next month.
Huawei has partnered with electronics contract manufacturer Flextronics for making Honor smartphones, reportedly some three million units to start with.
Inaugurating the manufacturing plant at Chennai, IT and Law Minister, Ravi Shankar Prasad said, Huawei was the 40th manufacturing unit in the country and such new initiatives by technology leaders will help accelerate the growth of local manufacturing industry in India. “The investment in electronics manufacturing, which was around Rs 11,000 crore, has risen to Rs 1.24 lakh crore,” Press Trust of India quoted him saying.
The Huawei-Flextronics venture is expected to create close to 10,000 jobs.
India is a very important market for Huawei. The company has launched a series of products, for both Huawei and Honor brands, including the launch of Huawei’s flagship P9. It also will be collaborating with Google to make its premium Nexus 6P device.
Along with the focus on manufacturing, Huawei said it will strengthen its after sales services in India with over 200 service centers, including 30 exclusive Huawei service centers. The Chinese telecom giant will also expand its distribution network by partnering with more than 50,000 retail outlets by the end of 2016.
“We have been present in India for the last 16 years and as part of our India focus, we have been consistently expanding our footprint in the market. We are convinced about the growth potential and future of India and we’ll keep looking for opportunities to increase our presence here,” said Huawei India CEO Jay Chen.
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