Top executives of Apple, Samsung, Xiaomi to meet government on August 19

In order to fast track electronics manufacturing in India, the government is meeting top bosses of smartphone makers like Apple, Samsung, Xiaomi as well as contract manufacturers like Foxconn, Dixon and Wistron on August 19. The roundtable meeting, to be chaired by electronics and IT minister Ravi Shankar Prasad, will be attended by chiefs of over 46 companies.

The government attaches high priority to domestic electronics hardware manufacturing as it is one of the important pillars of both ‘Make in India’ and ‘Digital India’. Recently, there has been increased pressure from countries like Vietnam, which is offering a slew of incentives to companies to set up manufacturing units. Due to free trade agreement, imports of TVs have increased multi-fold in India and companies like Samsung have shifted their TV production to Vietnam.

“The minister (Prasad) wants to understand their (companies’) concerns and also listen to their suggestions. The meeting is planned to evolve a conducive policy environment for the electronics industry to flourish in India,” said an official in the ministry of electronics and IT.

The official further said that national policy on electronics is already in place and due to the efforts of the government, India’s local production of electronics has increased from $29 billion in 2014-15 to $70 billion in 2018-19, at a compound annual growth rate of 25% during the last four years. Some of the notable names who are scheduled to attend the meeting are Peter Rhee, joint managing director (South West Asia), Samsung; Richard Hopkins, president of Flextronics; and Manu Jain, India head of Xiaomi.