Apple assures India plans intact despite Trump’s remarks: Report

APPLE has assured the Indian government that its investment and manufacturing plans in the country remain unchanged.

This comes after US president Donald Trump said he had asked Apple CEO Tim Cook to scale back manufacturing in India and focus more on the United States.

Following this, Indian officials spoke to Apple executives, who confirmed that India would continue to be a major base for manufacturing Apple products, according to government sources quoted by PTI.

"Apple has said that its investment plans in India are intact and it proposes to continue to have India as a major manufacturing base for its products," a government source told the news agency.

Earlier, Trump had said he spoke to Cook and told him he does not want Apple to manufacture in India, urging the company to increase production in the US instead.

"We have Apple, as you know, it's coming in. And I had a little problem with Tim Cook yesterday. I said to him, Tim, you're my friend. I treated you very well. You're coming in with $500 billion (£375.94 bn). But now I hear you're building all over India. I don't want you building in India. You can build in India if you want to take care of India," Trump said.

He said India is one of the highest tariff nations and doing business there is difficult.

"They've (India) offered us a deal where basically they're willing to literally charge us no tariff. So we go from the highest tariff. You couldn't do business in India... But I said to Tim... we treated you really good. We put up with all the plants that you built in China for years. Now you got to build us. We're not interested in you building in India. India can take care of themselves. They're doing very well. We want you to build here. And they're going to be upping their production in the United States, Apple," Trump said.

Cook has said Apple will source most iPhones sold in the US from India in the June quarter. China will produce most of the devices for other markets amid uncertainty around tariffs.

Government sources said that 15 per cent of global iPhone production currently comes from India. Foxconn, Tata Electronics, and Pegatron India (largely owned by Tata Electronics) are involved in iPhone manufacturing.

Foxconn has also begun manufacturing Apple AirPods in Telangana for export.

An analysis by S&P Global showed that iPhone sales in the US reached 75.9 million units in 2024. Exports from India in March were at 3.1 million units, indicating a need to either expand capacity or redirect phones meant for the domestic market.

"Apple's Indian exports already headed predominantly to the United States, which represented 81.9 per cent of phones exported by the firm in the three months to February 28, 2025. That increased to 97.6 per cent in March 2025 as a result of a 219 per cent jump in exports, likely reflecting the firm looking to preempt higher tariffs," the S&P Global Market Intelligence report said.

In April, Indian minister Ashwini Vaishnaw said that iPhones worth £13.22 bn were exported from India in FY25.

The Apple ecosystem in India is also one of the largest job creators, with an estimated 2 lakh people employed across its vendor network.

(With inputs from PTI)