Reports: Apple and Foxconn Ramping iPhone Production in India

05 AUGUST 2022 - There’s word in the world that Apple is looking to up its iPhone game on the subcontinent. MacRumors cites a report from The Economic Times saying:

Foxconn, Apple's largest supplier, is looking to further expand its presence in India with the opening of a new production facility within an existing factory in the country to produce the iPhone…

One wonders what iPhone they’ll be building. To this point, one might have assumed iPhone 13 or earlier, though TF International analyst Ming-Chi Kuo may have thrown a spanner in that assumption. While lots of you were sleeping Thursday night/Friday morning, the analyst hit Twitter with a three-post thread. Quoting the first:

My latest survey indicates Foxconn's iPhone production site in India will ship the new 6.1" iPhone 14 almost simultaneously with China for the first time in 2H22 (India being one quarter or more behind in the past).

“In the short term,” says the second Tweet:

…India’s iPhone capacities/shipments still have a considerable gap with China, but it's an important milestone for Apple in building a non-Chinese iPhone production site.

He wraps with Tweet number three, saying:

It implies that Apple is trying to reduce the geopolitical impacts on supply and sees the Indian market as the next key growth driver.

That snuggles in nicely with the MacRumors/Economic Times piece. It says the new iPhone facility inside the existing Foxconn factory “is part of Apple's goal to further diversify its supply chain.” Yes, it’s still almost-all-Foxconn almost-all-the-time. It’s not all China, though.