According to research firm Counterpoint, Apple was one of the fastest-growing brands in India during the December quarter. This was driven by multiple price cuts on its XR device, thanks to local manufacturing in India, it had said. It added that the rollout of new iPhones (11 series), aggressive pricing and a good channel strategy was helping Apple gain market share in India.
Sources say Apple is currently looking for a professional who can advise the company in dealing with the government.
Whether it's Carrefour, Ford, or other foreign majors, they are ready to adjust their strategies and design their plans in a way that would address the Indian consumption story.
From new and competitively-priced iPhones to slashing prices of its older models, it had a multi-pronged strategy.
Apple was a fringe player in all key categories like smartphones, notebooks, and tablets till recently. But with the last quarter's record-breaking performance, the brand has established itself in the country's price-sensitive consumer electronics market.
Apple and Samsung are international players and should work as a team with domestic companies to transform India into a global powerhouse: IT Minister Ravi Shankar Prasad.
'There is simply too much to watch, read and absorb.' 'Just online consumption (news, entertainment, social media) in India was 2.5 hours a day in November 2024.' 'Add TV (just under 4 hours), other media, and the figure is closer to 7 to 8 hours a day for over one-third of Indians,' points out Vanita Kohli Khandekar.
Rising prevalence of work-from-home and e-learning is driving sales of notebooks and tablets for most brands, but Apple's superior performance has more to do with its product quality.
It had requested the government to grant it 15 years of duty-free import of components to assemble its iPhones in the country, sharing a road map to slowly indigenise products.
The new iMac, two iPads and iPhone 12 and 12 Mini will be open for ordering starting April 30, just like in the US, the UK, China and Japan.
Seven months after it was launched in India, Apple is expected to start manufacturing the iPhone 13 at the Foxconn plant in Sriperumbudur near Chennai from April, according to sources. The phones will be for both the domestic and export market. The production of the iPhone 13 in the Chennai plant was meant to start from January but had to be postponed after Apple suspended production following protests in December by women workers about food poisoning. An Apple spokesperson did not respond to an e-mail query.
"We are investing in India... We've already launched an app accelerator centre. That's on top of working with the channel and looking at expanding our go-to-market in general," Cook said during the company's third quarter earnings call on Tuesday.
It's time India re-visited its Western alliances for the attitude and approach that the West reserves for the nation when it comes to security cooperation of the kind that they might not have visualised outside of China, India's bug-bear, asserts N Sathiya Moorthy.
Former winners Vidarbha will rely on their red-hot form to stake claim for a title they last won over five years ago, while first-time finalists Kerala will be driven by grit when the two contrasting teams clash in the summit showdown for the 90th Ranji Trophy, starting in Nagpur on Wednesday.
South Korean consumer electronics major Samsung, which on Wednesday launched its latest smartphone Galaxy S25 in San Jose, US, will also be manufacturing it at its Noida plant in India, J B Park, president & CEO of Samsung Southwest Asia, said. Moreover, the Bengaluru-based R&D centre of Samsung, the biggest outside South Korea, has "contributed significantly" for developing the S25 series of Galaxy AI.
The US-based company, in collaboration with partners like Wistron and Foxconn, had recently started assembling iPhone 11 in India.
DeepSeek is a case in point on how economic interdependence between nations are utilised for geopolitical ambitions and global domination efforts, observes China expert Srikanth Kondapalli.
Still, the earliest India will get to experience Apple online will be early 2020 and the company's first fully-owned signature store should be up around 2022 -- almost two decades after it had opened its first store worldwide, writes Nivedita Mookerji.
Making the Pixel 8 in India will not necessarily bring the price down -- witness iPhones made in India that are more expensive than those in the US and Dubai.
The Prayagraj airport in India is experiencing a surge in air traffic due to the Maha Kumbh, a major religious festival. The airport is handling an average of 40 non-scheduled charters and private jets daily, with figures reaching 70 on weekends. This is in addition to the average 148 scheduled commercial passenger aircraft operating daily. The airport recently received a contingent of about 180 politicians from Rajasthan and has seen corporate bigwigs like the Ambani brothers, Gautam Adani, and Pawan Munjal pass through. The airport has also hosted four international flights since the beginning of the Maha Kumbh, including a flight carrying Laurene Powell Jobs, the wife of Apple co-founder Steve Jobs. The airport is currently undergoing an upgrade and expansion, and officials are looking forward to the government's plans to integrate Prayagraj with the airports at Kashi and Ayodhya to promote tourism in the region.
'The way the bank is doing in the past 4-5 quarters, no reason to see why we will not be able to achieve that.'
Sports films have their own unique charm, but those centered on the Olympics and Olympians stand apart, depicting unparalleled tales of grit, guts, gumption, and glory.
The editorial, titled "Ahimsa Award for the Executioner?", criticized Congress leader Shashi Tharoor for praising the entrepreneurial growth of Kerala under the Left government. It argued that it was "suicidal" to weaken the party from within when the Congress was actively opposing the shortcomings of the LDF government. The editorial also criticized Tharoor's positive remarks on Prime Minister Narendra Modi's recent US visit, calling it a mere gesture by two administrators to improve their image.
With its age-old fascination for education, southern states have done better than the North. Start-ups, IT hubs, and industry majors setting up shop have changed the face of the South. Nearly 79% of global offices set up by international conglomerates in India are in the South. Almost 46% of tech unicorns are from the South. The GDP per person in the South is 4.2 times higher than the North. None of these indicators can be ignored by any central government, whatever the political compulsions, notes Ramesh Menon.
The company posted quarterly revenue of $50.6 billion.
The Maha Kumbh, billed as the world's largest gathering, concluded on Wednesday after 45 days, with lakhs of devotees taking a dip in the Sangam, the confluence of the Ganga, Yamuna, and mythical Saraswati rivers. Despite a stampede that killed at least 30 people, millions continued to visit the Kumbh, seeking salvation through the ritual bath. The event saw a mix of faith, tradition, and technology, drawing pilgrims and tourists from across the globe.
'If you are not prudent, you may exceed your budget, and if it happens too often, you may end up in debt.'
He noted that the infrastructure in India has come 'quite a ways' since Apple began to put a lot of energy in the Indian market 'because of their leadership and so forth.'
Apple CEO Tim Cook has said the company's share in India "is quite low relative to the size of the opportunity" and setting up retail stores in the future in the country will be a great initiative. Apple launched the Apple Store online in India on September 23, offering Apple's full range of products and support directly to customers across the country for the first time. "If you take India as an example, we doubled our business last quarter compared to the year ago quarter. But our absolute level of business there is still quite low relative to the size of the opportunity. "And you can kind of take that and go around the world and find other markets that are like that as well," Cook said on Wednesday in the company's Q1 2021 results earnings call.
India's smartphone market grew by three per cent year-on-year (Y-o-Y) in volume in the third quarter (Q3) of calendar year 2024, while its value surged by 12 per cent Y-o-Y to reach an all-time record for a single quarter, according to a report by research firm Counterpoint. The value growth was driven by an ongoing premiumisation trend, while the increase in volume was driven by an earlier onset of the festival season compared to the previous year.
To promote localisation of manufacturing and reduce its import bill, the government increased basic customs duty on mobile handsets - from 10 per cent to 15 per cent.
Tech major is in discussion with film-makers, sport administrators to enter the fast-growing sectors.
Superheroes, snowmen, freedom fighters, Sukanya Verma lists everything the OTT channels have to offer this week.
A sneak peak into 14 gadgets released recently: four in India and the rest worldwide.
iPhone, which accounts for just 3% of sales in India's 100 million-plus annual smartphone market, plans to partner an existing player
'If tech giants like Amazon, Google, Apple and Meta enter the IPL broadcasting arena, it could further revolutionize sports media in India.'
Paving way for iPhone maker Apple to open its own stores India, the government on Monday relaxed FDI norms by giving a three-year exemption from local sourcing to foreign players in single-brand retail and a further five-year relaxation for 'state-of-art' and 'cutting-edge' technology.
rediffGURU Chandrakant Lahariya tells you how to lower your blood sugar levels and manage your diabetes.
Till recently, iPhone production in India was limited to older models at a lower price tag. So far, Apple has localised production of five smartphone models - iPhone SE (1st Gen), 6S, 7, XR and 11.
The delay of the SE 2, billed as the cheapest iPhone and tentatively priced below Rs 40,000 in India, puts the brakes on the tech major's plans for a revival. With the supply chain at its largest manufacturer Foxconn in disarray, as it is struggling to operate in China because of the COVID-19 crisis, the postponement was inevitable.
