Wistron exits India Apple biz over scale, work culture

New Delhi: Wistron is packing its bags. The company is in the process of selling its iPhone assembly unit in Kolar, near Bengaluru, to the Tata Group, which is currently holding trials for assembling upcoming iPhone 15 models in India.

This departure comes as Apple’s other contract makers Foxconn and Pegatron double down on India.

Wistron was the first of Apple’s three global contract manufacturers to start assembling iPhones in India in 2017. But its inability to get deeper into Apple’s supply chain–component manufacturing and vendor-managed inventory holding—is one of the key reasons the Taiwanese contract manufacturer is exiting India, the world’s second largest smartphone market.