South Korean tech group Samsung has announced the opening of the largest mobile phone manufacturing facility in the world, on the outskirts of New Delhi.
Based in Noida, the facility is set to serve the fast-growing smartphone market in India which increasingly caters to local consumers looking to buy tech-enabled phones at lower prices.
The company said it will also export the handsets made there, using the factory to double its current capacity for phones to an annual 120m units and manufacture everything from its cheapest model to the Samsung S9.
Additionally, the factory will allow Samsung to manufacture phones as a whole at a lower cost due to its scale, analysts familiar with the sector told Reuters.
The news comes despite sales of the tech giant's smartphones slowing worldwide in recent months, leading the company to say on Friday that its second quarter profits will likely miss previous expectations.
Read more: Samsung and LG warn second quarter profits are likely to miss expectations
Opened jointly by Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi and South Korean President Moon Jae-in, Samsung's newest facility is bound to be a part of Modi's so-called Made in India campaign, which imposes taxes on smartphone component imports in a bid to encourage local manufacturing efforts and boost jobs as a result.
Data from Bloomberg showed that India attracted its highest ever foreign direct investment in the past year, totalling $62bn (£46.6bn).
The country's current most popular smartphone maker is Xiaomi, after India beat the US to become the world's second-largest smartphone market after China. Its market grew 14 per cent in 2017, shipping a total number of 124m units to become the fastest growing among the top 20 markets.
Xiaomi said in April that it plans to set up three new factories in India to meet demand, also as part of Modi's Made in India initiative.
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