Apple shifts some iPhone 14 production from China to India
Apple has begun making iPhone 14s in India, as it moves some production away from China for the first time against a backdrop of Chinese Covid-19 pandemic lockdowns and geopolitical tensions between the US and the country’s communist government.
A production line in Chennai has begun operation, assembling the iPhone 14 for the domestic Indian market. The move, which marks the first time the company has assembled iPhones outside of China in the same year they were released, is part of a plan to disentangle its manufacturing operations from the Chinese state.
Apple unveiled its latest line-up of iPhones earlier this month. The iPhone 14 will have improved cameras, faster processors and longer lasting batteries at the same prices as last year’s models.
India is the world’s second-largest smartphone market after China and Apple has been assembling phones there since 2017. But until now, manufacturing operations in the country, alongside similar operations in Brazil, had been focused on assembling older models.
According to a report from analysts at JP Morgan, Apple is aiming to produce a quarter of all iPhone 14s in India by 2025, and the same proportion of all its products outside China by the same date, compared with about 5% now. The company also intends to produce a fifth of all its iPads and Apple Watches, and more than half of all its AirPods, in factories in Vietnam by the same date.
Relations between China and the US have become increasingly strained, causing difficulties for Apple.
This summer, Apple requested suppliers in Taiwan – including chip manufacturers – to label the origin of their products as “Chinese Taipei” in order to comply with a long-standing but previously unenforced Chinese rule that requires imported
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