China's Move Impacts iPhone Production in India: What You Need to Know

At a time when Apple was preparing to ramp up production of its next flagship iPhone in India, hundreds of Chinese engineers and technicians working at its main supplier, Foxconn’s factories, have been told to pack up and leave.

Over 300 skilled workers have exited Foxconn’s iPhone plants in southern India, reported Bloomberg. While Foxconn and Apple haven’t officially commented, the timing and silence speaks volumes.

The development is more than just a routine reshuffle of manpower. It comes amid growing tension between Beijing and Western tech firms shifting manufacturing away from China and the border dispute between India-China.

For Apple, which has invested heavily in expanding its manufacturing footprint in India, the loss of trained Chinese technical staff is a setback. These engineers were not only involved in assembling devices but also in training India’s workforce and transferring decades of process knowledge built inside Chinese mega-factories.

China’s clampdown on the outflow of talent, technology, and equipment has grown sharper in recent months. According to Bloomberg, the Chinese government has informally urged companies and regulators to stop exporting key equipment and restrict movement of skilled labour to destinations like India and Southeast Asia.

Foxconn, which still produces the bulk of iPhones in China, has gradually built large-scale assembly lines in India over the past four years. In 2024, Apple hit a milestone: more than $10 billion worth of iPhones were assembled in India, of which about $7 billion were exported, mostly to the US. India now accounts for nearly 20% of Apple’s global iPhone output.

Without them, India’s new recruits will have to climb the learning curve without real-time mentoring. And that’s not easy when producing devices that require over a thousand individual components to be assembled with microscopic precision.

India’s own economic retaliation against China after the 2020 Galwan Valley border clash was largely symbolic, banning apps like TikTok and curbing Chinese investments in sectors like telecom and power.

Apple's India expansion is a direct result of US-China trade tensions that began under former President Donald Trump. Those tensions have now matured into strategic moves from both sides, America offering tax breaks and trade deals to countries like India and Vietnam, and China responding with restrictions on tech, talent and raw materials.

Whether Apple can weather the change without disrupting its production targets, or whether China has found an effective brake on the shifting axis of tech manufacturing, will become clear in the months leading up to the iPhone 17 launch.

For now, the silence from Apple and Foxconn may speak louder than any official statement.

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Published By: Sonu Vivek Published On: Jul 3, 2025

According to the source: India Today.