As President Trump tries to pressure Apple into making iPhones in the US, one of the company’s top manufacturing partners, Foxconn, is making investments elsewhere.
Foxconn is investing $1.5 billion in its Singapore subsidiary, Hon Hai, which is building and expanding plants in India, according to Bloomberg. A stock exchange filing describes this as a “long term investment,” with no change to Foxconn’s business model. Foxconn didn’t offer more details, but the company already has several factories in India.
Apple has been trying to move US iPhone production from China to India to avoid paying hefty US tariffs. “For the June quarter, we do expect the majority of iPhones sold in the US will have India as their country of origin,” Apple CEO Tim Cook said in an earnings call earlier this month.
That doesn’t sit well with President Trump, who has been using tariffs to strongarm companies into bringing their manufacturing to the US. Last week, Trump even called out Cook. “We are not interested in you building in India. India can take care of themselves. They are doing very well. We want you to build here [in the US],” he said.
Hence, Apple’s focus on India might create future clashes with the White House, which also criticized Amazon and Walmart for informing customers about potential tariff-related price increases. That said, Apple has committed to investing $500 billion over the next four years to build manufacturing facilities for the company’s AI and server needs in the US. But so far, the company has refrained from extending the same commitments to iPhone production.
In the past, Cook has said that Apple has long relied on China’s manufacturing because of the country’s extensive IT supply chain, which can easily source tens of thousands of skilled workers, in addition to being low-cost.
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In February, before Trump’s sky-high “reciprocal tariffs” were announced, Foxconn offered vague promises to modify its manufacturing, saying it would “work with our partners together in different places [in] the US, where there will be some related arrangements.”
Foxconn has now dimmed its financial outlook, citing the potential impact of Trump’s tariffs.
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About Michael Kan
Senior Reporter
