In the Context of India Emerging as 2nd Largest Mobile Phone Market and a
Growing Manufacturing Powerhouse: Bhupesh Raseen, Chairman–Mobile Advisory Committee, TMA
In the recent years, India smartphone market has witnessed a boom culminating in India emerging as the second largest smartphone market in the world. India’s mobile handset market is set to grow nearly five times faster than the world’s largest smartphone market – China, where growth has decelerated.
With new companies entering the stratosphere, Indian companies have made vital contributions to this milestone. Today, India is the second-largest telecommunications market in the world with over 1.05 billion subscribers. The year 2018 is a year of experiments for the smartphone industry with handset players attempting various strategies as they have different agendas to achieve their distinct goals.
The PMP has been notified with the objective of substantially increasing the domestic value-addition for the establishment of a robust mobile handset manufacturing eco-system in India. In the last two years, easing of tax regime for domestic mobile manufacturers resulted in setting up of 40 new mobile handset manufacturing units and 30 mobile components and accessory manufacturing units in India, resulting in the direct employment for over 1 lakh people. These units also have the potential to generate indirect employment to 2 lakh people.
The PMP aims to take this growth story to a new level and it is estimated that the value of India’s domestic mobile handset manufacturing industry would grow exponentially over the next 5-10 years and will and generate more jobs. This move is also expected to encourage foreign players to manufacture products in India.
In recent years, majority of smartphone companies are setting up manufacturing units in India rather than procuring readymade products from China. The first step to building a manufacturing eco-system in the smartphone category entails local assembling through emerging or established third party manufacturers.
The next step to making India’s manufacturing ecosystem more robust is for companies to bring their complete infrastructure to India. The demand for smartphones is growing exponentially in India especially in Tier II and III markets. Local smartphone manufacturing will contribute sizably to the the growth of the economy.
Government’s Make in India’s initiative has been pushing companies to invest in India and to focus on local manufacturing. The mobile industry’s contribution to the country’s GDP currently stands at 6.5% ($140 billion) and is likely to become 8.2% by 2020. The domestic consumer electronics and durables sector has witnessed a substantial amount of growth over the last few years, emerging as an important contributor to the economy providing employment to millions.
With the long-term vision and continued support given by the government, India is on the right path to develop a complete ecosystem for manufacturing excellence.