268 Factories & 6.5 Lakh Jobs In 4 Years: India's Phone Manufacturing Sector Continues To Grow

Over the last couple of years, the Indian government has been really pushing the Make in India movement to the forefront, especially where technology is concerned.

And that's worked to an extent, as India surpassed Vietnam to become the #2 mobile manufacturer in the world last April.

Amitabh Kant, the CEO of Niti Aayoog (National Institution for Transforming India), posted that again on Twitter today, with supposedly updated numbers from the industry. He indicates there are now 268 manufacturing plants set up around the country, creating a total of 6,50,000 jobs. Production, he says, has reached a $31 billion threshold, with 65 million chargers exported in 2018.

Make in India performance in Mobile Manufacturing sector. India surpassed Vietnam to become No 2 manufacturer in the world. pic.twitter.com/ILc62YODko

¡ª Amitabh Kant (@amitabhk87) January 17, 2019

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Of course, we're not all the way along yet. Right now, these are mostly assembly plants in India, we're not actually manufacturing components yet. Those are still being shipped in from China.

The government recently cut taxes on the import of the hardware necessary to manufacture these components locally, but it'll take some time for brands to set up the infrastructure needed. Not to mention it might be cheaper for the many Chinese brands in our market to manufacture in their own countries.

Reuters

In the overall manufacturing jobs sector in India, mobile manufacturing jobs have grown quite rapidly in the last four years -- making smartphones more affordable for Indians to buy as a result.

Either way, it's a nice little reminder of how far we've come from the early 2000's when we were some of the last people in the world to get mobile phones.