Prabhu RamChinese smartphone maker Vivo has said that it will invest more in India to bring its design and research and development (R&D) centres to support its ‘make in India’ strategy, having already announced Rs 4,000 crore investment in setting up a new manufacturing plant in Uttar Pradesh that will generate 5,000 jobs in its first phase.
“In the near future, we believe we will invest even more in bringing design to India and R&D to India. We are evaluating all those options,” Nipun Marya, director-brand strategy, Vivo, told ET.
Analysts said that setting up R&D centres is a natural extension of the smartphone makers’ ongoing India strategy, which will help the brands predict and be on top of the trends faster than the competitors.
They said that over the next few years these R&D centres will catalyse the Indian mobile handset ecosystem and contribute to the generation of new intellectual property as well as new made-for-India smartphone innovations.
“As a result, the India mobile handset market will become the hub for new smartphone innovations, not just for India but the world,” said Prabhu Ram, head of the industry intelligence group at CyberMedia Research.
