INDIA BECOMES WORLD'S SECOND BIGGEST MOBILE PHONE MANUFACTURING HUB

[INDIAPOSITIVE]

https://twitter.com/x/status/1709180421991460877

https://twitter.com/x/status/1709180545283084741

 

[VkdIndian]

That’s a great news. It wasn’t long back when the manufacturing had shifted to India. Nay sayers were laughing and making fun about this effort. What a slap on their sorry faces.

I salute Modi and his team, who conceived this idea and made it a huge success. It is one of the many other and bigger initiatives.

I can say, this is just a start. Dekhte jao aage, hota hai kya.

 

[Skull and Bones]

We need to focus on making the sub components inhouse, starting from LCD panels, to SMD components and chipsets.

 

[karmaa]

https://twitter.com/x/status/1709180421991460877

https://twitter.com/x/status/1709180545283084741

Get ready to see posts from usual suspects.

 

[Kuru]

This is the validation of hard work. Congratulations to all those who are involved in this.

 

[Puffin]

We need to focus on making the sub components inhouse, starting from LCD panels, to SMD components and chipsets.

Absolutely critical that this is achieved, meaningless without it.

 

[Faceless]

Before the usual suspects start their ramblings, here is the answer to your taunts

STEP 1 Assemble Smartphones using imported parts

STEP 2 Instead of importing the said parts assemble the said parts using even lower value imports

Eg. earlier we used to import the whole screen for assembling them in our smartphones but now Samsung's Screen Manufacturing plant in UP manufactures display units using imported wafers

Future STEP 3 Start Manufacturing these lower value imports like Screen wafers in India

 

[A Voice of Reason]

Before the usual suspects start their ramblings here is the answer to your taunts

STEP 1 Assemble Smartphones using imported parts

STEP 2 Instead of importing the said parts assemble the said parts using even lower value imports

Eg. Samsung's Screen Manufacturing plant in UP manufacturing Screens using imported wafers earlier we used to import the whole screen for assembling our smartphones

Future STEP 3 Start Manufacturing these lower value imports like Screen wafers in India

Yah, moving up the value chain is a sensible plan if you can do it.

There is apparently no product on earth that currently has so many components and sub components that crisscross back and forth over so many international borders as todays smart phones. Anything that will simplify and help secure the supply chain will be an advantage. Once again, if you can do it.

 

[nahtanbob]

Absolutely critical that this is achieved, meaningless without it.

independently you can manufacture components for complex systems

 

[nahtanbob]

Inside One iPhone Factory Powering Apple’s Pivot to India

Apple is betting big on India. Here's how that's playing out for workers in an iPhone factory in South India.

time.com

Apple supplier Pegatron to halt operations at India plant for second day after fire

Apple supplier Pegatron has told its factory workers not to report for work on Tuesday, halting the assembly of iPhones for a second straight day at its south India factory where a fire broke out on Sunday, three sources told Reuters.

www.reuters.com

 

[INDIAPOSITIVE]

https://twitter.com/x/status/1711303112236187737

 

[VkdIndian]

@INDIAPOSITIVE , these threads work like chilli on open wounds.

Poor chaps are creating multiple threads based on fake social media posts or posts by random people to create negative image against India after reading these posts.

$ 5.5Billion to dekhe bechron ko kai saal ho gaye, aur India hai ki record pe record bana raha hai.
These same mullahs had forecast not too long back that these PLI schemes are a sham and would fail badly.

Bahut dard hua hai becharon ko.

 

[nahtanbob]

The Story of One iPhone Factory Powering Apple’s Pivot to India​

Set back from a dusty highway in South India, three newly completed factory buildings rise up behind a black spiked iron fence. In their shadow, several yellow construction vehicles sit beside mounds of upturned soil and the skeleton of a half-built warehouse. On a May afternoon this year, a group of women in blue and pink uniforms hurried from one building to another over the din of traffic and construction.

This factory complex in Sriperumbudur, an industrial town in Tamil Nadu state, is one of Apple’s most important iPhone assembly hubs outside of China. It is operated by Foxconn, a Taiwan-based electronics manufacturing company. Three times per day, the gates to this factory open to swallow buses ferrying thousands of workers—around three-quarters of them women. These workers spend eight hours per day, six days per week, on a humming assembly line, soldering components, turning screws, or operating machinery. The factory is one of the biggest iPhone plants in India, with some 17,000 employees who churn out 6 million iPhones every year. And it’s fast expanding.

Most of the 232 million iPhones Apple sold in 2022 came from factories in China, with many of them originating from a single massive Foxconn facility in Zhengzhou. But shifting geopolitical tides have recently forced Apple to re-evaluate its exposure to China. First came the pandemic, when Beijing’s harsh lockdowns badly disrupted global supply chains. Now U.S. intelligence assessments, made public this year, say that Chinese President Xi Jinping has instructed his military to be prepared to invade Taiwan by 2027, and President Biden has said the U.S. would defend Taiwan in that scenario. A hot war with China could have disastrous consequences, not only for the world, but also for Apple’s ability to manufacture many of the products behind its $2.7 trillion business.

et back from a dusty highway in South India, three newly completed factory buildings rise up behind a black spiked iron fence. In their shadow, several yellow construction vehicles sit beside mounds of upturned soil and the skeleton of a half-built warehouse. On a May afternoon this year, a group of women in blue and pink uniforms hurried from one building to another over the din of traffic and construction.

This factory complex in Sriperumbudur, an industrial town in Tamil Nadu state, is one of Apple’s most important iPhone assembly hubs outside of China. It is operated by Foxconn, a Taiwan-based electronics manufacturing company. Three times per day, the gates to this factory open to swallow buses ferrying thousands of workers—around three-quarters of them women. These workers spend eight hours per day, six days per week, on a humming assembly line, soldering components, turning screws, or operating machinery. The factory is one of the biggest iPhone plants in India, with some 17,000 employees who churn out 6 million iPhones every year. And it’s fast expanding.

Most of the 232 million iPhones Apple sold in 2022 came from factories in China, with many of them originating from a single massive Foxconn facility in Zhengzhou. But shifting geopolitical tides have recently forced Apple to re-evaluate its exposure to China. First came the pandemic, when Beijing’s harsh lockdowns badly disrupted global supply chains. Now U.S. intelligence assessments, made public this year, say that Chinese President Xi Jinping has instructed his military to be prepared to invade Taiwan by 2027, and President Biden has said the U.S. would defend Taiwan in that scenario. A hot war with China could have disastrous consequences, not only for the world, but also for Apple’s ability to manufacture many of the products behind its $2.7 trillion business.

Powering Apple’s pivot to India is Foxconn. By 2024, Foxconn hopes to nearly quadruple its production at this South Indian factory to 20 million iPhones per year, and reportedly plans to hire tens of thousands more workers to make that possible. Satellite images provided to TIME by Planet Labs show rapid expansion at the complex, with three new factory buildings constructed over the past two years and newly broken ground on space large enough to accommodate at least three more. Apple could manufacture 25% of all iPhones in India by 2025, up from just 5% in 2022, according to a JPMorgan analysis.

This shift toward India has winners and losers. Foxconn has a history of low pay, harsh working conditions, and exacting targets in its Chinese factories. And as Foxconn rushed into India to meet Apple’s demand, it created comparable conditions there. In 2021, 159 factory workers were hospitalized with food poisoning, as a result of eating unhygienic food at a subcontractor-provided hostel. That incident set off a wave of protests that, for several days, drew media attention to the squalid living conditions faced by iPhone assembly workers. The hospitalizations were followed by a government inspection into the factory—which has not previously been reported—that described numerous safety risks and workers’-rights violations. That government inspection, carried out in December 2021, prompted Foxconn to spend $1.6 million on improving health and safety in the factory with oversight from Apple and the state government of Tamil Nadu, Foxconn said in a statement to TIME.

This story is based on an unreleased government document reviewed by TIME, as well as interviews this spring with four current workers and eight community organizers in and around Foxconn’s Sriperumbudur factory. All workers spoke on condition of anonymity, out of fear that speaking to the media would invite retaliation. “What we do in this factory is not what we studied for,” one female worker told TIME. “But it has become a matter of survival for our families.”

Apple declined TIME’s request for a reporter to be given a tour of the Sriperumbudur factory for this story, and refused two requests to make a senior executive available for an interview. Foxconn did not respond to similar requests. In a statement, an Apple spokesperson said that the issues at the Sriperumbudur factory were addressed after the food-poisoning incident, and added that regular Apple audits have found that the conditions in the factory are continually improving. Foxconn said the health and safety of its employees is “a top priority.”

This shift toward India has winners and losers. Foxconn has a history of low pay, harsh working conditions, and exacting targets in its Chinese factories. And as Foxconn rushed into India to meet Apple’s demand, it created comparable conditions there. In 2021, 159 factory workers were hospitalized with food poisoning, as a result of eating unhygienic food at a subcontractor-provided hostel. That incident set off a wave of protests that, for several days, drew media attention to the squalid living conditions faced by iPhone assembly workers. The hospitalizations were followed by a government inspection into the factory—which has not previously been reported—that described numerous safety risks and workers’-rights violations. That government inspection, carried out in December 2021, prompted Foxconn to spend $1.6 million on improving health and safety in the factory with oversight from Apple and the state government of Tamil Nadu, Foxconn said in a statement to TIME.

This story is based on an unreleased government document reviewed by TIME, as well as interviews this spring with four current workers and eight community organizers in and around Foxconn’s Sriperumbudur factory. All workers spoke on condition of anonymity, out of fear that speaking to the media would invite retaliation. “What we do in this factory is not what we studied for,” one female worker told TIME. “But it has become a matter of survival for our families.”

Apple declined TIME’s request for a reporter to be given a tour of the Sriperumbudur factory for this story, and refused two requests to make a senior executive available for an interview. Foxconn did not respond to similar requests. In a statement, an Apple spokesperson said that the issues at the Sriperumbudur factory were addressed after the food-poisoning incident, and added that regular Apple audits have found that the conditions in the factory are continually improving. Foxconn said the health and safety of its employees is “a top priority.”

Life inside the Foxconn factory​

Foxconn implemented some positive changes in the months after the inspection, protests, and factory closure, according to three workers who spoke with TIME. Foxconn removed a rule that workers had to live in subcontractor-provided hostels, and increased workers’ salaries by 5,000 rupees ($60) per month to cover the costs associated with renting accommodations independently. Both the food in the factory’s canteen and the working conditions on the factory floor have improved since the protests, the workers said, while acknowledging that significant problems remain.

Since the factory shut down and reopened, four current workers told TIME in May, it is generally a safer place to work. The same workers, however, complained of high production targets, as well as a system of subcontracting that in effect creates a two-tier workplace where a comparatively small number of Foxconn employees enjoy greater benefits and job security than a legion of temporary workers, hired by third-party Indian subcontractors, who also work inside the factory. (Three of the current workers TIME spoke with were employed via subcontractors; one was a Foxconn employee.)

While the workers TIME spoke to agreed that conditions in the factory had improved since the 2021 protests and subsequent inspection, they also said that many problems persist. One problem three workers mentioned was their wages: ranging from 82 to 101 rupees per hour for slightly different roles inside the factory, equivalent to between $0.99 and $1.22 per hour. While such wages are more than double Tamil Nadu’s minimum wage for electronics workers, and still better than the perils of unemployment or work in India’s vast informal sector, they give workers little opportunity to move up the economic ladder, especially since many of them have children and elderly parents to support. “In the Indian context, this is not a terrible wage. It’s not a fair wage, but it doesn’t shock me,” says Ramapriya Gopalakrishnan, a labor lawyer based in the nearby city of Chennai. To rent a room in the towns surrounding the factory would cost around one-third of a worker’s monthly paycheck, she says. “To support two kids in school on top of that, and support a mother and father, it would be very difficult.”

Before the beginning of each daily shift at Foxconn’s Sriperumbudur factory, Foxconn managers announce production targets. Some days, according to two assembly-line workers, the targets can require each worker to work on as many as 520 iPhones per hour—or one every seven seconds. At those rates, each worker on the production line could handle some $4 million worth of iPhones every day.

Every worker on this assembly line has a designated task. Some are experts at attaching a specific component to the iPhone’s motherboard. Others have learned the precise finger movements necessary to tighten an individual screw. At regular stages some workers perform quality checks, to make sure nothing has gone wrong as each phone barrels from one point along the assembly line to the next.

Meena, a contract worker on the factory floor, says she spends eight hours per day, six days per week, hunched over her station, fingers constantly in movement. “Some days, I don’t even get time to go to the restroom because I have to meet my production targets,” she says. “If the supervisor notices that products are piling up on the conveyor belt at my stage, he will reprimand me.” Her delicate task—the specifics of which, like her real name, TIME is not revealing in order to protect her identity—causes pain in her fingers, wrists, elbows, shoulders, neck, and back, Meena says. If she changes her position to alleviate the pain—for example by crossing her legs—a supervisor will often hassle her to sit properly, she says. Foxconn allows workers facing health issues to take short rests and provides them with over-the-counter pain medication, Meena says. But after her rest break, Meena says she is still expected to continue at a demanding pace for the rest of the day.

Meena is not employed directly by Foxconn. Instead, like many of her colleagues in the factory, she is employed by a third-party contractor. This system is not unique to Foxconn, according to Gopalakrishnan, the labor lawyer. It’s common in the Indian manufacturing sector, she says, because it helps factory owners maintain a flexible workforce to which they bear few legal obligations.

“Unlike fixed-term employees, these so-called contract laborers do not know even whether they can earn their livelihood beyond tomorrow—that is the degree of uncertainty we are talking about,” says Gopalakrishnan. “This whole contract labor system is designed to lower labor costs and evade responsibility for compliance with labor laws.”

At the Sriperumbudur factory, contract workers do not receive sick leave or vacation days, and are not given copies of their contracts, according to three who spoke with TIME. Foxconn earlier this year instituted a new policy there, the workers said, whereby if contract workers take leave on a consecutive Monday and Saturday, their monthly salary will be docked by 1,500 rupees ($18), the equivalent of several days’ pay. And if workers take three days of consecutive leave, their salary will be docked 5,000 rupees ($60), the workers said.

This appears to describe more violations of Apple’s supplier code of conduct. Apple says in the document that it holds its suppliers to the “highest standard” of labor. It specifically says that they must not use wage deductions as a form of discipline, must not prevent workers from taking bathroom breaks, and must take steps to mitigate “ergonomic hazards” including painful postures and repetitive movements.

In statements to TIME, neither Foxconn nor Apple commented on the allegations of wage deductions, poorer conditions for contract laborers, ergonomic hazards, or high production targets. “We work with relevant local agencies to ensure that all recruitment efforts follow Foxconn’s recruitment standards and guidelines, as well as local labor regulations,” a Foxconn spokesperson said. “Foxconn communicates and cooperates with stakeholders, wherever we are, to continuously create an operating environment that is healthy and competitive, while protecting the rights and interest of our employees.”

“We have the highest standards in the industry for our suppliers and regularly assess their compliance to our code of conduct,” an Apple spokesperson said. “With multiple feedback channels, including employee surveys and anonymous reporting, we are constantly looking for ways to raise the bar even further.”

Back at the perimeter of the Foxconn factory complex, past the mounds of dirt and the skeletal frame of the half-constructed warehouse, beyond a security hut manned by guards in white shirts, are two rows of what appear to be worker housing buildings. Both rows are four stories high and 100 meters long, and lined with concrete balconies.

These buildings may be a taste of what is to come. With Apple keen to ramp up iPhone production in India, Foxconn is reportedly planning to build huge hostels for as many as 60,000 workers near its Sriperumbudur factory. Construction is currently under way on a large plot of land inside the Foxconn complex. As a result, workers at the factory are concerned that Foxconn may again require its employees to live in company-run hostels, and could revoke the 5,000-rupee ($60) housing allowance that it currently pays its workers to cover the cost of their outside accommodation, according to three workers who spoke with TIME. (Foxconn declined to comment on its plans.)

Meanwhile, the most expensive iPhone 14 retails for $999. The most expensive iPhone 15 retails at $1,099. While Apple does not publicly disclose the difference between an iPhone’s final sale price and how much it costs to produce, the company’s most recent financial results say that for every dollar of income from product sales, the company makes around 35¢ as profit.

The four workers at the Sriperumbudur factory who spoke to TIME said that while it’s unlikely they would easily find higher wages elsewhere, they still feel they deserve better. It would take the lowest-paid among them around six months to save enough to buy a single iPhone 15—and that’s if the worker never paid for rent, food, or to support her family. “When I compare my salary to the cost of an iPhone, obviously they can pay me better,” one young woman says.

—With reporting by Barath Raj/Sriperumbudur and Varsha Bansal/Bengaluru