Apple is trying to diversify its supply chain away from China on rolling pandemic lockdowns there, as well as geopolitical headwinds between US and China, on one hand, or China and Taiwan, on the other, as that’s where the headquarters of its main assembler Foxconn is located.
Foxconn, however, has also built operations in India, in factories near Chennai, and Apple’s iPhone 14 production diversification effort there went so well, that it was able to start shipping phones made in India mere weeks after the Chinese output instead of the two months expected initially.
According to Jeff Pu, an analyst with Haitong International Securities, “India is now an attractive location for manufacturing as it offers better labor cost structure while Apple is looking to reduce geopolitical risks,” while Aruna Sundararajan, a former government secretary there, adds that “all major companies are now looking at India as part of their ‘China-plus one’ or ‘China-plus two’ strategy.”
When asked for a comment on the successful transition of part of the iPhone 14 production schedule from China to India, Apple simply commented that it is “excited to be manufacturing iPhone 14 in India,” somewhat confirming that the conveyor belt launch has been smooth and earlier than anticipated.
Apple started its production plans in India slow, with lowly entry-level iPhones like the SE, assembled by Winstron, then moved up the ladder to handsets like the iPhone 13 in the newfangled Foxconn factories.
It typically doesn’t start manufacturing there on the same year the iPhone models are released, but 2022 is apparently different as it is in a hurry to diversify production away from China.
Coordinating hundreds of component and critical material suppliers, delivering assembly equipment, and training a competent workforce must have been a Herculean task. Tim Cook’s supply chain management knowledge and Foxconn’s production prowess must have coalesced to shine with an iPhone 14 Indian production mere weeks after Foxconn started assembling the new series in China.
