Amid growing mobile market, Spice to set up manufacturing unit in Noida

Telecom solutions company Spice is looking at setting up a mobile handset manufacturing unit in Noida, Uttar Pradesh.

Spice is a joint venture between Transsion Holdings, a global mobile phone conglomerate and Indian homegrown entity Spice Mobility.

“We have plans to set up a unit in Noida and there is a possibility of things taking shape in the next 6 months,” Spice CEO Sudhir Kumar said here on Tuesday. The proposed Noida factory could either be Greenfield or Brownfield unit, which would be decided in due course.

Currently, the company is sourcing handsets from three original equipment manufacturers (OEM) in India, of which two are based in Noida, while another is located in Daman.

In recent years, Noida and Greater Noida have emerged as the country’s mobile phone assembly hub with brands such as Lava, Intex, Karbonn and Samsung setting up their units. These plants basically churn out mobile phone handsets from imported knocked-down (CKD) kits, mainly sourced from China.

Noida has a capacity to manufacture over 140 million handsets per annum, which equals almost 40 per cent of the country’s yearly demand.

Recently, Union IT minister Ravi Shankar Prasad had said more initiatives were in offing to boost electronics manufacturing. The segment is vital for creating millions of jobs in near future for both skilled and semi skilled workforce.

The domestic mobile phone production is estimated to touch 500 million devices by 2019-20.

Meanwhile, Spice launched 5 new feature phones and 3 smartphones in Lucknow. The fresh product portfolio is priced between Rs 850 to Rs 9,500. Transsion Holdings is targeting to strengthen its foothold in India, which is the world’s fastest growing mobile market with the addition of its third brand in their multi brand portfolio.