Manu Jain, VP, Xiaomi Global and MD Xiaomi India was quoted as follows, “Xiaomi’s high-quality, well-designed products at honest prices have been instrumental in disrupting the Indian smartphone industry. In 2015, we extended our long-term commitment to the Indian market by joining the Make in India programme. Today, we are deepening this commitment with three more smartphone factories and our first SMT plant dedicated towards local manufacturing of PCBA units. Xiaomi is one of the pioneers in the country to start local assembly of PCBAs, and I believe we will continue to play a key role in transforming India into a global manufacturing hub.” The announcements were part of the first Supplier Investment Summit, a program wherein more than 50 global smartphone component suppliers learn about the Indian Manufacturing ecosystem. If it goes through then this is said to be the biggest ever single investment in the electronic manufacturing industry, one that can create as many as 50,000 job opportunities. Apart from the economical benefits, the new plants are also expected to help Xiaomi increase the manufacturing capacity. Xiaomi’s decision to open an SMT (Surface Mount Technology) plant in India comes on the heels of the Indian government announcing 10% import duties on certain components including PCBs. In 2015, Xiaomi had announced for the first time that it will be manufacturing its devices locally in India. Three years down the line, the company now has five manufacturing units in India alongside the new SMT plant.
We are fully committed to Women Empowerment! Overwhelming to see how their lives have transformed after they started working at our plants.#XiaomiSummit #MakeInIndia #WomenEmpowerment pic.twitter.com/aXOjxKyiRd — Manu Kumar Jain (@manukumarjain) April 9, 2018 Xiaomi has also been working towards enabling women empowerment. The company claims that more than 95-percent of the 10,000 employees in Xiaomi’s factories (operated by Foxconn) are women. All said and done, Xiaomi has been very aggressive when it comes to the Indian market. They have narrowed down the gap between Chinese and Indian smartphone launch considerably and have also recently launched the Mi Crowdfunding platform in India. Earlier this year, all the major analytic firms including Canalys and Counterpoint found that Xiaomi has emerged as the leader when it comes to smartphone shipments in India (Q4 2017).
