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Riding on the back of the government’s production linked incentive (PLI) scheme, India’s mobile phone exports surged past Rs 25,000 crore in January 2025, and is expected to cross Rs 1,80,000 crore by the end of this fiscal, marking a significant 40% jump over last year, as per industry body India Cellular & Electronics Association (ICEA).
The surge has been primarily led by a strong push by Apple, which has set up – through its contract manufacturers – a sizable assembly base in the country. It is estimated that iPhone exports during April-Jan were close to Rs 1 lakh crore, against Rs 60,000 crore in the same period last year. Of the total exports in January, close to 70% came from Apple via iPhone shipments.
Apple’s push to broaden its manufacturing base in India comes on the back of the company looking to diversify such operations away from China, amid geopolitical tensions. India has emerged as a favourable destination for the company as far as iPhone assembly is concerned, even as a substantial chunk of the device’s production is still centred in China.
The PLI for large scale electronics manufacturing, which was first announced in 2020 with an outlay of Rs 38,601 crore, offers incentives ranging from 4 to 6 per cent on net incremental sales of eligible products over the sales in the base year to the selected applicants. Due to production under the scheme, handsets became the second highest exported product from India, at $13.1 billion, during April-November 2024.
Until June last year, the scheme had helped create 1,22,613 direct jobs as well, The Indian Express had reported. The PLI scheme has topped the allocation at Rs 8,885 crore in Union Budget 2025-26, significantly higher than allocation for PLI schemes of other ministries.
As per ICEA, since the launch of the PLI scheme, mobile phone production in India has doubled—from Rs 2,20,000 crore in FY24 to Rs 4,22,000 crore in the ongoing fiscal. “Looking ahead, production is set to reach an estimated Rs 5,10,000 crore in FY25…” ICEA said in a statement.
It also projected that mobile phone exports could exceed approximately Rs 1,80,000 crore by the end of the ongoing fiscal. “This represents approximately 40% growth over the previous fiscal year, crossing Rs 1,29,000 crore and an estimated over 680% growth since the inception of the PLI scheme in FY20-21. Mobile phone export is the largest growth driver within electronics, with the US standing out as a key market for India’s smartphones,” ICEA said.
Under the PLI scheme for smartphone manufacturing, the government has disbursed close to $1 billion (Rs 8,700 crore) in the three years from 2022-23 to 2024-25, with Foxconn, Tata Electronics and Pegatron, the three contract manufacturers of Apple receiving cumulatively over 75 per cent of the amount.
Overall, five beneficiaries collectively received more than 98 per cent of the total disbursals: Foxconn (Rs 2,807.17 crore), Tata Electronics (Rs 2,067.51 crore), Pegatron (Rs 1,724.36 crore), Samsung (Rs 1,365.91 crore) and Padget Electronics (Rs 596 crore).
Apple’s contract manufacturers, Foxconn, Tata Electronics and Pegatron (which was recently acquired by the Tatas), have received a total of almost Rs 6,600 crore over three years — 2022-23 and 2024-25, as per data obtained by The Indian Express through a Right to Information (RTI) application.
The RTI data also revealed that in 2022-23, the first year when PLI incentives were disbursed, the maximum subsidy of Rs 953 crore was issued to Wistron (later acquired by Tata Electronics).
In 2023-24, Foxconn, which is Apple’s biggest contract manufacturer globally, received a subsidy disbursal of Rs 2,450 crore, the highest during the year. However, in 2024-25, the data showed no incentive was issued to Foxconn. In 2024-25, Samsung received the highest subsidy of close to Rs 958 crore.
Besides Apple and Samsung, local contract manufacturer Dixon (Padget Electronics) has also benefited from the scheme. The company manufactures smartphones and feature phones for companies such as Xiaomi, Google, Samsung, and Motorola.
But, some other domestic companies such as Lava, Bhagwati, and Optiemus, have failed to meet PLI targets to get incentives.
The actual investments made by companies producing under the PLI scheme was slightly lower at Rs 8,282 crore until June 2024, compared to the total subsidy disbursal of Rs 8,700 crore.
