Tata Group plans to add up to 45,000 workers at iPhone parts plant

Tata Group is planning to multiply the number of employees at its electronics factory in southern India that makes iPhone components, adding tens of thousands of workers as part of a push to win more business from Apple Inc.

The plant in the industrial town of Hosur, in Tamil Nadu state, will hire as many as 45,000 women workers within 18 to 24 months as it sets up new production lines, people familiar with the matter said. The factory, which produces iPhone housings or the cases which hold the device together, currently employs about 10,000 workers, most of them women.

The salt-to-software conglomerate is among Indian companies trying to benefit from Apple diversifying its supply chain beyond China. While just a small fraction of iPhones and its components are made in India,