India has potential to scale up laptop, tablet manufacturing to US$ 100 billion by 2025: ICEA

India has the ability to increase its combined production capacity for laptops and tablets to US$ 100 billion by 2025 through structural reforms, ICEA, the mobile device industry body, said on Wednesday.

Scaling up the production of laptops and tablets would take India's share of the global market from 1% to 26% at present.

Moreover, it will create 5 lakh new employment and contribute to a combined inflow of US$ 75 billion in foreign exchange and more than US$ 1 billion in investment by 2025.

Mr. Pankaj Mohindroo, Chairman of the India Cellular and Electronics Association (ICEA), said the country's electronic market has crossed US$ 65 billion with significant contributions from mobile phones.

“We are still dependent on imports for laptops and tablets, and 87% of it is imported from China. In India, the laptop market is not a very big market. Tablets are actually a small market. These are the largest IT products after cell phones.”

"By developing laptops and tablets for the world in India and gaining a major share of the global market, we will have a manufacturing value of US$ 100 billion by 2025," said Mr. Mohindroo.

The National Policy on Electronics 2019 (NPE) envisages a turnover of US$ 400 billion in electronic manufacturing by 2025, of which US$ 190 billion is projected to come from the cell phone market.

According to ICEA, whose members include, among others, Apple, Xiaomi, Motorola, Nokia, Foxconn, Flextronics, Lava, Vivo, the domestic market will account for approximately US$ 170 billion by 2025, and there is a need to focus at the remaining US$ 230 billion in export markets to reach the 2019 NPE target.

The government has set a target of US$ 110 billion for the production of electronics from cell phone manufacturing for export.

The laptop and tablet market in India is very limited, according to ICEA, and most of the manufacturing can be done for export to markets in the US, Europe, and others.

Mr. Mohindroo said the production-related incentives scheme of the government has provided a boost to the electronics industry, and further addressing cost disability will boost the country's laptop and tablet production.

"Tablet production provides an enormous potential for Indian businesses currently making cell phones," he said.

India's manufacturers suffer from various challenges, such as high-power prices, taxes, and ease of doing business, rendering India almost 10-20% less competitive than Vietnam and China, respectively, the report said.

India must resolve these problems in the long term. In the meantime, by offering incentives that are WTO-compliant, easy to enforce and help India take off from the export trajectory, the government can aim to mitigate these challenges.

"PLI scheme for the mobile phone manufacturing sector will help to significantly improve the competitiveness of India," the report added.

Disclaimer: This information has been collected through secondary research and IBEF is not responsible for any errors in the same.