NEW DELHI: With the US and China agreeing to a tariff truce, Apple is reviewing its aggressive plans to scale up in India. While the “regular expansion and China+1 production diversification plans will continue as envisaged”, sources said the iPhone strategy being drawn up exclusively for the US market will be “temporarily put under review”.“We await clarity on the geopolitical situation and the tariffs. Things have been moving at a fast pace, and there have been many sudden changes to the US govt’s stance on tariffs, including with regards to China where duty has been reduced drastically over the past few days. We will take a breather before embarking on any mega production expansion plans in India with regards to exclusive supplies to the US,” a source told TOI.
US-China Tariff Truce Impact
The move comes as Trump — during his current Doha visit — said that he has asked Tim Cook not to source iPhones from India when it comes to meeting the needs of the US market. Trump’s stiff stance against outsourcing comes after Apple’s assurance to the US govt that it will invest $500 billion in America over the next four years, including for setting up a new advanced manufacturing facility in Houston to produce servers.The company said that it will add an additional 20,000 hires in the US by 2029.Rattled by Trump’s tariffs, Cook had recently announced India as the mainstay for iPhone supplies to the US. “For the June quarter, we do expect the majority of iPhones sold in the US will have India as their country of origin,” Cook had said in response to a question at the company’s quarterly earnings call on May 2.Following Trump’s latest statement, Indian govt sources said that Apple has assured them about maintaining its investment plans in India through manufacturing partners Foxconn and the Tata group. “Apple has said that there will be ‘no let up’ in the regular investment plans that began in the post-Covid period after the introduction of the production-linked incentive (PLI) scheme for smartphones. The China+1 diversification will continue.Only the exclusive US supplies are under review.”A senior govt official told reporters that companies decide on their production facilities based on multiple factors, including revenue, productivity and competitiveness, and these are commercial decisions.
