Why is India making it easier for foreign companies to open up shop?

The country has become a technological center in Asia, and loosening its regulations should help the industry grow even more rapidly, analysts say.

|
Stephen Lam/Reuters/File
People wait in line for the opening of the next generation of iPhone at an Apple Store in San Francisco.

India announced new rules for foreign retailers on Monday, loosening a past requirement that foreign investors must locally source 30 percent of the goods sold in their Indian stores.

The rules were meant to protect Indian manufacturers and producers, but relaxing the rules will enable technology giants such as Apple to open their doors and even begin manufacturing in India, which will create millions of jobs and help bring India into the 21st century, something Prime Minister Narendra Modi has discussed extensively.

"In this digital age, we have an opportunity to transform the lives of people in ways that were hard to imagine just a couple of decades ago," said Mr. Modi in a September speech to about 500 technology leaders, including the chief executives of Microsoft, Google, Adobe, and Uber, in San Jose, Calif., reported The New York Times

The government also announced that foreign investors are now allowed to own up to 100 percent of domestic airlines, raising the limit from 49 percent, The Wall Street Journal reports. The relaxing of regulations for foreign firms comes a year after India and the United States reached a cooperative agreement about renewable energy. At that time, President Obama worried about the foreign investment exemption, also called the "Make in India law."

According to The Hindu Times, "India [maintained] that U.S. subsidies on solar products threaten Indian manufacturers, and the domestic solar industry has accused the U.S. of 'dumping cheap outdated technology' on India."

US officials responded that India should not focus on making technology in India, but on taking technology if it wants to keep developing at a fast pace. Earlier this month, the Christian Science Monitor's Ben Rosen reported:

India is already an emerging global technology hub. With investments from Amazon, Google, and Apple, Hyderabad will only contribute to India’s startup scene centered in Bengaluru. During a December visit, Google chief executive officer Sundar Pichai announced a program to train 2 million developers in the country, for which it will partner with 30 universities across India. The Indian-born CEO also shared plans to expand free WiFi in 100 railway stations and a rural internet program for women from pilot to full-scale program to cover three lakh villages in three years, The Hindu Times reported.”

With this new law, Apple will be able to tap into the Indian smartphone market, which is expected to grow at a compound rate of 23 percent annually through 2018 and will soon become the second-largest smartphone market in the world after the United States.

Apple has historically had low iPhone sales in India. The company sold 2 million in 2015, which, according to Counterpoint Research, gives Apple only 2 percent of the country's overall market. Neil Shah, director of Counterpoint Research, told CNET the problem is that prices are too high for many potential buyers in the nation.

Establishing itself as a retailer in India would increase Apple's brand presence and enable Apple to sell its phones directly to its customers. Specifically, selling refurbished phones would help the company tap into the lower-budget market. With this move, analysts say, Apple will be able to establish itself in India while the market is growing quickly as sales for the iPhone stagnate in the US and China. But India's ultimate goal is to see Apple products made locally.

In May, Apple announced it will open up a development center in the southern city Hyderabad, a major center for the technology industry, that will focus on the tech giant's Maps app and create up to 4,000 jobs, according to the company. That same week, Apple announced it will be opening an iOS design and development accelerator in Bengaluru, another Indian tech hub.

"The talent here in the local area is incredible and we are looking forward to expanding our relationships and introducing more universities and partners to our platforms as we scale our operations," Tim Cook, chief executive officer of Apple, said, according to CNET.

You've read  of  free articles. Subscribe to continue.
Real news can be honest, hopeful, credible, constructive.
What is the Monitor difference? Tackling the tough headlines – with humanity. Listening to sources – with respect. Seeing the story that others are missing by reporting what so often gets overlooked: the values that connect us. That’s Monitor reporting – news that changes how you see the world.

Dear Reader,

About a year ago, I happened upon this statement about the Monitor in the Harvard Business Review – under the charming heading of “do things that don’t interest you”:

“Many things that end up” being meaningful, writes social scientist Joseph Grenny, “have come from conference workshops, articles, or online videos that began as a chore and ended with an insight. My work in Kenya, for example, was heavily influenced by a Christian Science Monitor article I had forced myself to read 10 years earlier. Sometimes, we call things ‘boring’ simply because they lie outside the box we are currently in.”

If you were to come up with a punchline to a joke about the Monitor, that would probably be it. We’re seen as being global, fair, insightful, and perhaps a bit too earnest. We’re the bran muffin of journalism.

But you know what? We change lives. And I’m going to argue that we change lives precisely because we force open that too-small box that most human beings think they live in.

The Monitor is a peculiar little publication that’s hard for the world to figure out. We’re run by a church, but we’re not only for church members and we’re not about converting people. We’re known as being fair even as the world becomes as polarized as at any time since the newspaper’s founding in 1908.

We have a mission beyond circulation, we want to bridge divides. We’re about kicking down the door of thought everywhere and saying, “You are bigger and more capable than you realize. And we can prove it.”

If you’re looking for bran muffin journalism, you can subscribe to the Monitor for $15. You’ll get the Monitor Weekly magazine, the Monitor Daily email, and unlimited access to CSMonitor.com.

QR Code to Why is India making it easier for foreign companies to open up shop?
Read this article in
https://www.csmonitor.com/Business/2016/0620/Why-is-India-making-it-easier-for-foreign-companies-to-open-up-shop
QR Code to Subscription page
Start your subscription today
https://www.csmonitor.com/subscribe