Looks like most of the manufacturers have their eyes set on making an investment in India. In the latest move, Indian handset maker, Lava has announced to make a whopping investment of Rs. 200 Crores in the country. The company is aiming at strengthening its design and testing operations in India over a period of 18 months. It is also planning to set India the major export hub for its devices in the coming years.
Lava comprises of around 250 employees in India, and around 550 employees in China. In July, Lava announced that it will be investing a sum of Rs. 2,615 crores over the coming seven years in India, for setting up two manufacturing units in the country. These upcoming units will be equipped to manufacture 18 million handsets per month (combined). Other manufacturers such as Samsung, Spice, Micromax, and many more, already have assembly units in India.
Lava International CMD Hari Om Rai said in a statement,“We are making India a major manufacturing hub and in the process, we are expanding design, testing and R&D teams also. We will invest about Rs. 200 crores in the next one-one and half years. We will bring the entire manufacturing ecosystem to India. Our plan is to expand exporting to other countries next year and hopefully, by 2019, we will export to China itself. The plan to ramp up capacity is in line with that vision,”
Recently, global manufacturers such as Xiaomi, Gionee and Asus have also announced their assembly units in India, Andhra Pradesh, in collaboration with Foxconn. The main agenda of these manufacturers is to make the most out of the multi-billion dollar worth growth in India, as it is one of the fastest growing smartphone markets. The reports also suggest that India might overtake the US as the second-largest market in the forthcoming years. As per IDC, smartphone shipment in India increased 21.4 percent year-on-year to 28.3 million units in July-September 2015 quarter.
Currently, Lava ranks fifth in India with 4.7 percent of market share. Whereas, other manufacturers such as Samsung ranks first with 24 percent share, Micromax ranks second with 16.7 per cent share, Intex ranks third with 10.8 percent share, and Lenovo-Motorola rank fourth with 9.5 percent share.
