Some of the world’s biggest tech companies, including Dell Technologies Inc, HP Inc and Apple Inc supplier Hon Hai Precision Industry Co (鴻海精密), also known internationally as Foxconn Technology Group (富士康科技集團), have applied for state aid to manufacture laptops in India.
Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s US$2.1 billion financial incentive plan — a bid to boost local production of technology hardware such as laptops, personal computers, tablets and servers — has received an overwhelming industry response, Indian Minister of Electronics and Information Technology Ashwini Vaishnaw said on Wednesday.
Under Modi’s plan, companies are entitled to cash back of almost 5 percent of factory prices of finished products. Sourcing components locally would help manufacturers win more financial benefits.
32 companies, including units of homegrown contract manufacturers such as Optiemus Electronics Ltd and Dixon Technologies India Ltd, had applied for the incentives before the application window closed at midnight on Wednesday.
The Indian government is trying to replicate the success of incentives it introduced in 2020 to jump-start the local assembly of smartphones. That plan led Taiwanese Apple suppliers Foxconn, Wistron Corp (緯創) and Pegatron Corp (和碩) to ramp up in India, helping Apple to produce about 7 percent of its global iPhone output in the South Asian country in its last fiscal year.
Modi’s administration expects companies to make an incremental investment of 24.3 billion rupees (US$294 million) and produce an additional output worth 3.35 trillion rupees under the six-year plan.
“India is emerging as a very trusted supply chain partner and also a value chain partner because it has good capabilities in design,” Vaishnaw told reporters at a briefing in New Delhi.
Companies could begin production under the plan by early next year, he added.
Apple has yet to apply for incentives to locally assemble its MacBook laptops and iPad tablets, Indian government officials said.
Shares of contract chipmaker Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) came under pressure yesterday after a report that Apple Inc is looking to shift some orders from the Taiwanese company to Intel Corp. TSMC shares fell NT$55, or 2.4 percent, to close at NT$2,235 on the local main board, Taiwan Stock Exchange data showed. Despite the losses, TSMC is expected to continue to benefit from sound fundamentals, as it maintains a lead over its peers in high-end process development, analysts said. “The selling was a knee-jerk reaction to an Intel-Apple report over the weekend,” Mega International Investment Services Corp (兆豐國際投顧) analyst Alex Huang
Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) is expected to remain Apple Inc’s primary chip manufacturing partner despite reports that Apple could shift some orders to Intel Corp, industry experts said yesterday. The comments came after The Wall Street Journal reported on Friday that Apple and Intel had reached a preliminary agreement following more than a year of negotiations for Intel to manufacture some chips for Apple devices. Taiwan Institute of Economic Research (台灣經濟研究院) economist Arisa Liu (劉佩真) said TSMC’s advanced packaging technologies, including integrated fan-out and chip-on-wafer-on-substrate, remain critical to the performance of Apple’s A-series and M-series chips. She said Intel and Samsung
TRANSITION: With the closure, the company would reorganize its Taiwanese unit to a sales and service-focused model, Bridgestone said Bridgestone Corp yesterday announced it would cease manufacturing operations at its tire plant in Hsinchu County’s Hukou Township (湖口), affecting more than 500 workers. Bridgestone Taiwan Co (台灣普利司通) said in a statement that the decision was based on the Tokyo-based tire maker’s adjustments to its global operational strategy and long-term market development considerations. The Taiwanese unit would be reorganized as part of the closure, effective yesterday, and all related production activities would be concluded, the statement said. Under the plan, Bridgestone would continue to deepen its presence in the Taiwanese market, while transitioning to a sales and service-focused business model, it added. The Hsinchu
Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) has approved a capital budget of US$31.28 billion for production expansion to meet long-term development needs during the artificial intelligence (AI) boom. The company’s board meeting yesterday approved the capital appropriation plan for purposes such as the installation of advanced technology capacity and fab construction, the world’s largest contract chipmaker said in a statement. At an earnings conference last month, TSMC forecast that its capital expenditure for this year would be at the higher end of the US$52 billion to US$56 billion range it forecast in January in response to robust demand for 5G, AI and
RSS